


The Crooked Kind

by Dream_tempo



Series: Loving You Was Just Like Raising Cain [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Case Fic, Demon Blood Addiction, Eventual Happy Ending, Fallen Angels, Hunters & Hunting, M/M, Men of Letters, Prostitution, Sam and Dean aren't siblings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-03
Updated: 2016-02-10
Packaged: 2018-05-18 02:43:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 29,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5894947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dream_tempo/pseuds/Dream_tempo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam Winchester comes from a long, storied line of Men of Letters and was a shoe-in to follow their legacy from the day he was born. </p><p>Dean Campbell started hunting in his teens and has been burning through assignments and partners ever since. </p><p>Castiel is the fallen angel that they're both in love with with an agenda all his own. </p><p>Basically my own reboot of Supernatural centered around how hunters would operate if the Men of Letters were still around. An overarching mystery in three parts about the nature of angels and demons and what happens when humans and affection are thrown into the mix.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Part One of the series, written as my NaNo project for last year. Finally finished editing with my favorite friend and the best writing partner, I'll be updating once a week until I catch up to myself or finish the story, whichever comes first. 
> 
> This is my first attempt at a more plot heavy story than I've ever done, so I hope it all works out. 
> 
> Cas' POV is always written in second person as well, so--

**Sam**

“If you wait out there much longer, you’re likely to catch your death.”

Sam can’t believe he’s here.

He fights the urge to turn and flee at the sound of the voice ringing out across the asphalt and reverberating off the imposing towers of brick that make up the tenement buildings surrounding him. Sam knows what he must look like- wool duster heavy with rain, glasses fogged opaque, standing on the gravel path in the middle of the night, stock still for something close to twenty minutes. In this part of town, that paints a very specific picture of a person. But that's not-- he's not--.

He turns his gaze to the ground and kicks at a few of the larger rocks, chewing on the inside of his cheek and letting a cigarette butt fall from between his lips—watching the cherry glow quickly die and wondering how in the hell he can be such a coward when it comes to this— be afraid in the face of something much more tame than he’s known for years.

Honestly, he’s not even sure why he’s here _now_ , of all times. Unlike so many who are burdened with this business, he’s never been one to sate his emptiness in such company. He's always been a man of other... predilections, more singular, solitary vices, but misery loves company doesn't it? And so now he's here. It’s a fact of life that with a job like theirs, none of them were quite cut out for monogamy, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t still crave _intimacy_ like everyone else, Hunters and Men of Letters alike.

Sam’s known about this house for close to a year— the storied ramshackle hut with a corrugated metal roof and red porch light stuck between and behind the nigh abandoned apartment complexes out in the ghetto. These kinds of things always manage to get passed around every few months, every region, every collection of men and women.

But this one—this one’s supposed to be special, something unheard of, impossible to come by, and for all the shit they’ve been put through on the account of the supernatural, there’s still a novelty to it that can’t be ignored. See, this 'knocking shop' is supposedly home to one of the rarest creatures on this earth, and being of a people who make their life knowing, understanding, and categorizing such things, the allure was always expected to get the better of him.

Tonight it finally did.

Tonight, after losing both of his own charges, after having his loneliness finally come crashing down around his ears, after doubting himself for the first time in a long time, he’s due for a little reassurance, in whatever form that may come. He grinds the smoking butt of his abandoned menthol with the heel of his shoe and strides up onto the stairs, wincing as the rotten boards creak, noticing for the first time the depth of the shanty he’s come to.

Situated as it is, it can’t be seen from the street, though it’s completely unassuming even if it could. The house, generously speaking, is a hodge podge of tin and soft wood—weeds with blooms growing out the crevices, a bird’s nest perched precariously in the corner of the gutter, and a small rusted lantern with a red bulb set out on the porch (no doubt the source of all the gnats that’ve given cause for the rickety screen door hinged over the heavy wooden which has been left open). Sam wipes his shoes on the Welcome mat— no matter— and shakes out his jacket before stepping inside, sweeping a critical eye over the acidic green shag carpet clashing so harshly with the vibrant orange linoleum countertops in the kitchenette at the back.

The living area is populated by a television so old it still has knobs on the front and an oversized, beaten up trunk serving as a coffee table in the center of the eclectic furniture. The metal covering the corners is so oxidized he can't tell what kind it is, but the leather casing the rest of it has worn well despite the deep gouges. There's the usual front room detritus strewn across it and a few curiously cartoonish pamphlets for local tourist attractions that he smirks at.

There's enough curios and oddities across every surface to occupy his attention for the next few hours, but his attention is caught by the drifting of a soft song. Standing over the stove, a smaller man sways back and forth while minding a sauce pan, quietly whistling a melancholy tune. His hair is dark and messy— so askew it can’t have been combed for days, and yet, not dirty or greasy in any sense. A pair of ragged jeans hang dangerously low on his slender frame- the legs too long and the hips too wide, but somehow so perfectly fitting. His torso is bare and Sam can’t hold back the small, awed gasp that sneaks out his lungs when he sees them. Stretched out across the majority of his back and shoulders, an inked outline of feathers seems to shimmer and writhe along with his movements. The set of wings look tattered and furled— clumps missing here and there— and Sam so badly wants to run his fingers along the edges of the tattooed lines to see if they smooth.

“If you’d please—“ The man glances back at him and nods, gesturing behind Sam’s shoulder with a small, not impolite, smile. When Sam looks back, he realizes he’d left the door open and he ducks his head, stepping over to close it up and hang his jacket on the hook fastened to its back. “Not all of us are dying for a cold and this room traps a draft with an appalling sense of vim.” The man turns back to his pot for a moment, scraping his spoon loudly across the bottom, before taking it off the heat and sidling over to the counter- chewing his bottom lip as he carefully pours out the dark liquid into two ceramic mugs, mesh filters balanced over their tops. “Tea?”

Sam takes a moment to recognize he’s being addressed— far too caught up in this spectacularly mundane exhibition—and stutters forward uncertainly. “You drink tea?”

The man looks up at him from beneath his lashes, expression playful, but chastising. “Yes. I drink tea, I wear clothes, I fuck men for modest amounts of money. As power hungry as you assume my brethren to be—for me, shock and awe grows old, fast.” The man crosses into the living room carefully balancing a mug in each hand, sweeping aside the papers on the trunk to sit Sam's down before dropping himself onto the wicker couch behind it. He takes a sip from one of the mugs, nonchalant as only the truly self-secure can be, resting his right ankle along his left knee. “The only questions of what I ' _can and cannot do'_ that I wish to hear will come later in the night, when your nerve has been resolved.”

Sam swallows thickly, once, before nodding a little too enthusiastically and moving to sit across from him. The only other seat in the tiny living area is a worn, brown leather recliner— holes in the back of the upholstery and springs squeaking as he sits, but surprisingly enough, it’s thoroughly comfortable. Sam smiles shyly, undoing the buttons on his cuffs and rolling up his shirtsleeves before reaching for his own cup, sniffing inquisitively at the steam and then taking a deep draft, shivering as it goes down.

“Like it? Cinnamon-orange with a generous spoonful of honey. My friend owns a greenhouse-- grows and dries leaves just for me. He prefers to always be trying new, stranger things, but I'm a bit of a creature of habit. This is one of my favorites for a cloudy morning.” The man lifts his mug to his lips and smiles playfully before shrugging. “I figured you could use a little since you’d rather catch pneumonia than come inside my house.”

Sam splutters around another mouthful, wiping away his spittle with the heel of his palm and feeling the tips of his ears burn. “I’ve never done this before…” He swirls the dregs of his tea in the bottom of the mug, idly watching the stray breakage swirl in the bottom, taking a second to realize what that actually sounds like. “Paid for it, I mean! I’ve _had_ sex before, just never with a prostitute… or—er- escort.” He screws his eyes tightly shut and wishes to be anywhere but here at the moment, scratching at his scalp and running a shaking hand through his hair.

He doesn’t hear the amused chuckle from the other side of the room, or the soft shuffle of clothes when the other man gets up, but when a delicate kiss is pressed to the tip of his nose, his own shuddering breath sounds exaggerated in the small room. “You Men of Letters, always so uptight and nervous.” The other man sounds exasperated, but fond as he takes the mug from Sam’s hands and puts it down behind him, scooting forward on his knees to rest between Sam’s shins. He takes Sam’s jaw in one hand, gentle but firm, and brings his face forward, placing chaste pecks against his closed lips and humming delightedly. “Lucky for you— I’ve _always_ liked to kiss and that _always_ seems to wind people down.” His free hand skims down Sam’s neck, chest, and hips, coming to rest on the outside of his thigh.

“Do you take a lot of men… like me?” Sam can’t help that he’s stalling, really he can’t. It’s just, that this isn’t at all what he’d been expecting. This man, though he’s not truly one, seems so caring and empathetic. He’s so… real. He'd thought-- he'd hoped this could be another easily justified tool to quell the shakes, something else that he could bury in his quest to cope. But a creature such as this isn't one that lets itself be cast aside so easily, Sam can see that in his every move, in the way he's spoken.

The man seems to only just refrain from rolling his eyes, dropping his hand from Sam’s chin and sitting back on his haunches. “Men of Letters, Hunters, even a witch or two has shared my bed. If that’s going to be a problem then you’re going to have to leave.”

Sam’s eyes widen and he starts to backpedal wildly, shaking his head back and forth. “No! No, that’s not what I meant… It’s just—“ He rubs the back of his neck and looks down and away. “I never would have thought—a lot of the men I work with—We’re all quite dedicated you see, and…” He laughs nervously and covers his face with his hands, feeling like he might actually choke on his own embarrassment. “Can we just start this from the beginning? I’m Sam, Sam Winchester.” Sam holds out his hand and waits with bated breath as the other man eyes him critically for several long seconds.

Slowly, carefully he takes Sam’s hand and begins to shake it. “Most men that come into my company don’t really care much for exchanging pleasantries or names… Somehow I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that’s your real one.” The other man lets go of Sam’s hand and quirks an eyebrow, looking something between amused and patronizing. He waits, silently, staring for another few seconds before standing and carrying the mugs back to the sink. “I’m Castiel, in any case. If lore is to be believed I was once the angel of Thursday, though that’s clearly not who I am now.”

Sam can’t help the thrill of excitement to have it so easily confirmed, to not have to try and wheedle it out of the man—Castiel. An honest to God fallen angel, right here, underneath his nose all this time. There have been hundreds cast out over the course of time, but all too often they wither away without the presence of their grace. An occasional few have been known to redeem themselves— prove that they’re worthy to ascend and gain back their father’s good nature. It’s assumed that this is what they all yearn for, what they spend their years on Earth striving for, but looking at Castiel now, Sam gets the feeling that might not always be the case.

“And before you ask,“ Sam startles out of his musings, blushing when he notices that Castiel surely must have caught him staring off into space. “I don’t remember anything of my time before. I’ve spent twenty-five good, long years here in the company of people that I respect and admire. For me that is enough.” Sam’s really not too sure what to say to that, liking to think that he wouldn’t have been so invasive and personal as some of the others probably have been, but knowing in his heart that he probably wouldn’t have been any better.

Castiel shifts his weight from foot to foot— waiting— his hips canting, teasingly, this way and that, as he stays back in the kitchenette area. “If you’ve come here simply to talk you’re not doing a very good job of it, and I’m afraid to disappoint you in that I’ve never been much of a conversationalist myself.” He gives a small, self-deprecating shrug and crosses his arms, leaning up on the balls of his feet. “I’m sure your innocent curiosity is well-received elsewhere, but here and now, I am less than enthusiastic about how the night has gone.”

Sam can’t help but scoff, unused to such frankness, especially by someone who is, essentially, a salesmen. “I’m sorry that I don’t quite meet your standards!” He wipes roughly at his mouth and sits forward on the recliner, perching on its edge and clapping his hands together. “Why don’t you _tell_ me how these encounters usually go?” He raises his brows, honestly thinking he’s gained some ground when Castiel just gives another shrug and ruffles his hair, shameless.

“Generally the second they get in the door the other men have their hands all over me. It helps that this body is slim and short— they like being able to throw me around, have an illusion of control. I don’t usually exhibit my power— in their minds fallen means frail.” Castiel starts to chew on his bottom lip, though Sam can’t tell if it’s from remembered anxiety or passion. “The clothes never stay on long. Generally I’m naked before we even get to my room. Most guys just want some hungry frottage and good head but the ones who fuck don’t take much more time. Like I said— I’m not usually here for the company. I’m the means to an end. They come, they clean up, they go.”

Castiel looks lost for just a moment before a small smile starts to ghost over his lips and one of his hands comes up to trace, ever so lightly, across the thatch of hair leading down into his jeans. “There’s a very rare few who like it when I get off, who’ll take the time and effort to lay with me.” He chuckles, softly, gaze far off in a memory. “They like to be fed and soothed and coaxed into the room. We kiss.” He closes his eyes and his free hand comes up to touch his lips as he starts to hum that same, sad tune. Eventually he comes back to himself and his hands fall away. He looks over at Sam and his eyebrows furrow. “What sort of man do you want to be?”

Honestly, Sam doesn’t know how to answer that question, not know. He knows what he'd preferred on the way over, but that was just the fantasy of this moment. Now that he's confronted with the real thing--. Well, why have a tool, another predictable, uncaring sex toy when there's the real, amazing, complicated thing? He’s always been a little bit more of a romantic than most people he knows, but to act that way towards a complete stranger? And one that's not even human?

He can’t get an honest read on this Castiel, never even coming close to pinpointing what he’s going to say or do next. He doesn’t know whether that’s a trait that comes with being in his line of work, with being a fallen angel, or just with Castiel himself. Sam wants to say that the other man is just throwing himself out there— wholly and unselfconsciously, but he’s wary that it’s some kind of act meant to draw him in and drive others away. He’s always had the desire to see the best in others— to implicitly give them the benefit of the doubt, and his own trust— but with all that he’s seen, he never has the luxury. 

After the silence has gone on for far too long, Castiel gives a weary sigh and lets his shoulders droop, turning towards the back of the house where it looks like a small dining nook has been made into claustrophobic bedroom. He heads towards it, unbuttoning his jeans and letting them crumple to the floor as he makes his way to the full-sized bed, dressed in cool blues and greys. He stops at the entryway, placing a hand on the arch and looking over his shoulder, eyes bored, completely unfazed by his own nudity. “Come or don’t, just get on with it.” Clearly done with what little posturing he had been attempting, he continues to saunter into the dark room, scratching his lightly furred ass on the way and then unceremoniously throwing himself down onto the mattresses.

Sam would like to say that the solution to his anxiety and great moral dilemma came from a great epiphany, that he had a moment of enlightenment that showed him exactly what to do and how to go about it, but in the end, it was just an unerringly mundane sense of lust that swayed his decision. He couldn’t even remember the last time that he got any, and if the rumors were true, having an _angel_ was, quite simply, transcendental. Just seeing Castiel, bare, waiting, had been more than enough to get his rusty motor going, and with a thick swallow, he finally stood from his chair and slowly started making his way over.

As he went, he toed off his shoes, loosened his tie and left it hanging from the back of a chair, unbuttoned his crisp, white dress shirt, and tossed his black leather belt across the floor. Leaning in the doorway, taking in the prone form on the bed for just a moment, Sam let himself go and fall into the fantasy of it. It was all too easy to imagine himself home late from work, having a glass of something strong to release the tension, before undressing and fondly watching his dear lover sleep—too weary to wait up all the night.

Stepping down into the alcove, he lets his button-down fall from his shoulders before crawling on all fours across the bed, gently brushing Castiel’s bangs out of his face with the tips of his fingers, smiling when his eyes flutter open. His heart clenches instantly, not minding his hesitations. Castiel’s voice is soft and gruff when he whispers, ”Hey.” and the smile he returns is shy, falling into the part, not missing a beat. Sam can’t help but think he really is quite good at what he does, with admiration.

He takes a deep breath before leaning down and letting their lips brush again, tentative, exploring. Castiel hums pleasantly, contentedly, pushing himself up on his elbows to meet the contact. A curious kind of relief rushes over Sam at the quiet intimacy and he pulls away to pluck at the hems of his undershirt, peeling it off and throwing it away in one clean movement. Castiel’s eyes slide over the newly bared skin, pausing at each of the tattoos he comes across before sitting all the way up and reaching out steady fingers to trace the words along his hip, then rush up to rest on the star inked over his heart. The largest and most complicated swaths of them had been etched into his back, and Sam secretly hopes they garner just as many intense attentions. 

He looks up at Sam through his lashes after a beat, curious, but carefully withholding. “Long day?” He ducks his head right after he asks it and goes back to fingering the deep black lines, biting his lip and inching steadily closer.

Sam finds himself nodding, fervently, the words sticking in his throat. “The kind you hope never to have, but know is always just around the corner.” He runs a hand across Castiel’s shoulder, along the nape of his neck, and into the dark, lush locks, all awry. He gently combs out a few of the knots, avoiding eye contact too, before thumbing at the other man’s cheek. “But I don’t want to think about that.” His throat clicks when he swallows and their eyes dart to meet, a dense, but not uncomfortable hush falling over the room. “Make me forget.”

* * *

 

It’s got to be into the morning hours now—the oppressive grey fog of earlier turned to a more pleasant, misty blanket across the city. Sam can’t help the pained whimper that blows past his lips as he arches off the bed, hips gyrating, chest so tight he can hardly breathe, cock so sensitive the pleasure has given away to hot pins and needles. Castiel runs his hands up his flanks, like he’s soothing a spooked horse, while taking him deeper, nuzzling into the nest of curls below Sam’s belly.

All coherent thought was lost something like an hour ago and all that Sam can see, smell, hear, is sex. His body is thrumming like a live-wire, nerves short-circuited, throat raw, muscles trembling, overwhelmed. There’s spunk on his stomach and chest, between his thighs, dried in the crack of his ass. There’re red scratches running parallel down his back and lovebites sucked into his hips and inner thighs and the backs of his shoulders. He shuts his eyes against it all and lets his hands run down to grip at the creases between his hips and thighs as he weakly thrusts up into the heat of Castiel’s mouth, mewling pathetically as he comes again, feeling tears prick at the corners of his eyes.

He’s not even sure if any semen came out that time and he collapses back onto the sheets, curling into himself. Distantly, he hears a rustling somewhere behind him, but he can’t be bothered to register what it might be, as he simply tries to catch his breath. A few seconds later Castiel pops over his shoulder, pressing the filter of a cigarette between Sam’s lips and holding up a lighter, waiting until the other man leans forward to start flicking at its switch. Sam’s honestly amazed he has the dexterity for it and takes a deep drag the second the tip goes up.

The nicotine floods through his system and he feels as though someone is breathing him back to life, inflating his used up body. When he lets the smoke spill back out his mouth, he feels strong enough to stretch out, push the soiled covers to the floor with his feet, and place his free hand behind his head. “ _Jesus Christ.”_

Beside him, Castiel snorts and scratches at his scalp, eyes closed. “ _No,_ it’s Castiel, remember? That daddy’s boy would never dare dream to take you for a ride like this.” 

The laughter that bursts out his own mouth takes Sam by surprise and he covers it by leaning over the edge of the bed to flick his ashes onto the hardwood floor, taking another long inhale before coming back up to puff smoke rings at Castiel. “You think you’re pretty clever, don’t you?”

Castiel only smiles and shrugs, burrowing under what sheets are left and then turning on his side, facing Sam. “That depends…”

“Depends on what?” Sam’s still a little high off the endorphins, the nicotine, the sheer selfish pride that he was finally able to get release, and doesn’t notice the shift in mood— the way Castiel pulls into himself and starts putting up a wall.

“Depends on whether or not you’re really as good as they say.”

Sam pauses, cigarette halfway to his lips, and turns his head, slowly, to catch Castiel’s eye. “What do you mean?”

Castiel’s face is carefully blank, all his human mannerisms cleared away as he lays stock still, voice scarily steady. “I don’t take money as payment. I take promises—favors.” Sam pinches out his menthol with the tips of his fingers and rolls onto his side, brow furrowing as his stomach gives a small lurch. “Nothing bad—nothing dangerous. Usually just information, research, updates. I won’t tell you what they’re for and you can’t ask.”

Sam thinks about arguing against it, not having been told the price before, feeling like he’s been backed into a corner, like this is some kind of blackmail, but as Castiel continues to stare him down the air in the room grows thick with the smell and taste of ozone and Sam swears he can hear it crackle. All at once, there is a sudden, vast enormity to the man beside him, the kind of depth that should only be ignored at your own peril. Pursing his lips into a tight frown, he gives an even tighter nod.

With that, Castiel settles back into himself, the tenseness dissipates, and the angel rolls onto his other side, turning away. A half dozen rumpled feathers stick to his skin before drifting down onto the bed, black as the hair on his head, shimmering like oil. Sam only barely contains his gasp, some of the ink on Castiel’s back having smudged, sweat washing it away.

He silently files away all the information from tonight, and hopes it was worth the visit.

* * *

 

**Castiel**

There’s a certain level of comfort you don’t allow yourself to reach with clients— that’s what you tell yourself at least.

Whistling softly as you toss a bowl of apples, lemon juice, and brown sugar, chest clenching tightly every time you think about who it’s for, you ignore the fact that that's a boldfaced lie. An honest truth, a whole truth, is that you have to tell yourself certain things to get through this, set goals and rules and guidelines— accept certain “facts of life” and just know that nothing will ever go according to plan. There’s a whole mess of ideals that you’ve made up for yourself, things about where you’re from, why you’re here, what certain knowledge is worth and the acceptable lengths to go to get it.

Everyone has different truths and different ways to live their life. Yours might be a little more on the fringes, but that doesn’t make it any less valid. That’s a statement you desperately want to believe is right, is accurate, but in the end, you’re just as unsure as with all the others. In any case, it’s one you’ve grown accustomed to, if not content with, and you’ve learned to love the small things.

Like the nights a freckled young Hunter rolls into town and holds you tight, kisses you soft, teases you shortly, and hums to you good and long—sad little tunes that make your eyelids flutter and your toes clench. Pulling down a glass dish from the open shelves, lining it with buttery pastry, and pouring the filling inside, you try your best to tamp down the butterflies in your stomach. You lay crosshatched strips of dough across the top, just like he likes, and turn to the oven when the burner phone on the counter starts to buzz. What little control you’d had slips instantly and with a little leap in enthusiasm, you toss the pie on the rack, shut the door with your hip, and grab at the cell.

All the fervor dies quickly when you see the name ‘Bobby’ pixelated, jarring, and appropriately black, flashing in the little window. You hesitate to flip it open, suddenly self-conscious of where you are, what you’re doing, the state you’re doing it in. Your arms fold across your chest impulsively, shrinking in on yourself, ashamed.

The phone continues to ring, not simply going to voicemail and giving you an out. Jerkingly, you cross over to the living room and perch on the couch, scooting back onto it and bending your knees up to your chest as the seconds stretch on. Finally, biting in your lip hard enough to draw blood, you flick it open and bring the earpiece to your head, whispering, “Pop?”

“God _dammit_ Castiel.”

“You really shouldn’t take his name in vain.”

“I’ll do whatever I damn well please, take a cue from your sorry little ass.” You wince, and if possible, curl even tighter into yourself—begin picking at an errant splinter in the couch.

“Sorry Bobby.” You are, really, wholly, truthfully. It’s just—

“Instead of having to always apologize, why don’t you ever try an’ just do the right thing the first time?” You hang your head and blink back tears. Always a disappointment.

“It’s a predisposition, by nature a bad son… remember?” The words hurt to say, but a lot less than they would have to keep inside.

“That’s not—why you always gotta turn things around like that? You know I didn’t mean it like that.” Instantly you feel guilty, selfish, sparing your own feelings over his. This man, he is everything. He is the only reason you’re still here.

“Sorry Bobby.” You’re a terrible conversationalist, always have been, always will be. You hunch your shoulders when he simply lets out a heavy sigh and you can imagine him there at home, heaving himself into the stupid, worn armchair that he spends the majority of his days in. You can’t help but smile, thinking he’d be reaching for a bottle of something strong with those damned plastic pincers you bought right after his accident, a crutch he took to with a surprising amount of gusto after the initial belligerence. You wish you could say the same thing about the electric stair seat that he almost never uses and a self-help book you had found to be quite useful yourself, entitled _Your New Normal,_ which you’re fairly confident is now keeping his dining room table level.

The very thought of the garage— of the house set at the center of a labyrinth of totaled cars, your own amateur iron sculptures dotting the perimeter, without the people and pollution of the city— makes you practically nauseous with homesickness. Suddenly, you want to be small again, curled up on Bobby’s lap, drowned in an old oil-stained t-shirt, dozing as he tells gruff stories about falling stars and little princes. You don’t want to be alone anymore, don’t want the weight of not knowing, nor the knowledge you’ve so painstakingly gained. Like Eve, you gave up your innocence so easily, without a backward glance, and you regret it every day.

Clutching the cell to your ear and a pillow to your chest, you can’t feel guilty for having missed almost every word he’s said, or for ignoring the ones that come after, because for this small moment, having his indirectly worried tone washing over you, you can pretend that you’re still there, that he can still walk, that you’re still his true son. 

* * *

 

It’s late by the time a pair of headlights flash through the front windows and though the pie had gone cold some hours ago and your good mood went with it, you still saunter to the door, the pale blue fringe of panties peeking out your soft grey sweats. But instead of being met with the dull roar of a hulking muscle, a compact classic purrs gently up the gravel, cherry red and comically undersized for the man inside of it. You can’t keep the disappointment from your voice when you call out his name and as he steps out of the car a confused kind of hurt flickers there too. 

“Were you expecting someone else?” Sam looks just as dapper as always, if not deliberately more casual than on his first visit. Again the crisp white button down, but now with the sleeves rolled up. Immaculate brown wool trousers with matching suspenders and scuffed penny loafers emulate the deep russet of his hair— pulled loosely back— and eyes, made larger by his thick frames. The complete package is so… delectable you should want to eat him right up. Instead you turn back into the house to try and rein in the sulking before he gets inside.

After a few long seconds, you hear Sam follow, shutting the door behind him. You should turn and greet him, make him feel at home, rub his feet and kiss his nose and make him loose with affection. You had the feeling, last time when he left, your explicit instructions in a manila envelope tucked into his jacket pocket, that he wasn’t going to be just blown over like all the others. He had questions and worse, a conscience. Really, you know that ingratiating yourself to him, smoothing away all the rough edges left by your demands is priority, but you can’t seem to care.

“Oh! Oh, wow. Did you make this yourself?” A hot surge of unbidden anger courses through you lightning quick and you can practically feel your hackles rising, whipping around to find Sam rooting around in the apple pie you left on the counter, without a thought.

“That was not meant for _you.”_ It’s a stupid thing to get worked up about, and maybe that only serves to make it all the worse, knowing that the response is excessive and uncalled for, but you can feel your eyes flash as you rush forward and push Sam up against the cupboard. His eyes go wide and for just a moment he’s frozen with shock, but then he pushes back, kicking at your feet as he does, and taking the both of you to the ground.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” His voice is raw as he fists a clump of your hair in one hand and locks your wrists with the other. Already the fight is dying out of you and you feel foolish, shameful, reckless. You let your head thunk back harshly against the cool linoleum and close your eyes, trying to breathe deeply and get ahold of some semblance of control. Talking to Bobby really threw you, set this fragile reality you’d set up off kilter, and when a certain someone hadn’t managed to show up, well… it just wasn’t a good night for a client. You should’ve put out the light, but just in case _he’d_ just gotten sidetracked, hit a rough patch of weather or something, you’d wanted the door open.

You’re regretting it now, as you eventually come to do with so many decisions these days, but it’s not Sam’s fault, and even if you feel like smiting him just to blow off some steam, you’ve really got to learn and keep a lid on these things. You can feel him breathing heavily just above you, knees still straddling your torso, and you wonder if you’ve already irrevocably fucked things up in only two visits. New record.

Once you’ve got ahold of yourself again, at least as much as you can manage, you open your eyes and sigh, frustrated, when you see a single feather floating back in the living room. “You done throwing a tantrum?” Several strands of hair have fallen out of the once neat tie, giving Sam a harried look, and though you’re certain he can’t have more than a few small bruises on his back, he’s definitely doubting your morality—probably, in his eyes, your humanity. They always measure the creatures they meet against themselves, as if they’re the standard. You roll your eyes and try not to push him further, but still bristle when he shakes his head slowly, disappointed, like you’re a particularly unruly child.

“Why, are you planning on punishing me? You into that Samuel— want me to be your bad little boy?” You wriggle suggestively beneath him and are pleased to see his cheeks flush and his mouth turn into a guilty frown, even while his pupils blow wide and his cock twitches against your stomach.

“Stop that.” His eyebrows furrow, but the command is weak and you arch weakly against him, only putting in enough effort to make it a show.

“Make me.” You bite at your lips and buck your hips, gasping with just the right amount of exaggeration when you feel him start to harden. “C’mon, you know you want to. Bend me over your knee, teach me a lesson, big daddy.” He chokes and splutters at that, angrily slamming your wrists back against the floor and leaning further over you, eyes set aglow.

He’s starting to look just a little bit wild, and you know you’ve just about got him. “I said stop.” You flutter your eyelashes and push up to meet him, stopping just short of his lips. You tilt your head and pout just the slightest, brushing the tips of your noses together and chasing his shallow, little breaths.

“I know you want me…” You run the tip of your tongue against his lips. “You’re so thick and heavy…” You grind up into him. “Show me—show me how much you want me…” You scrape your teeth along his chin and sigh, catching his wide eyes for a moment before licking again at his mouth, teasing and kittenish. “Take me.”

~~~

Your knees are going to be bruised and blistered come morning, but with Sam draped across your back, rutting against you like the very animal he’s imitating, the notion doesn’t seem to matter.

He’s snorting like a horse as he pistons in and out of you, ridiculously long cock splitting you open and making you see stars at the end of each thrust. His balls slap against your thighs with a resounding thwack thanks to the sweat, and provide a certain grotesquely erotic lewdness to the soundtrack of your consummation. He’s been going at it for the better part of an hour and you think that if he doesn’t just get on with it and make you come, you’re going to burst at the seams.

One of his hands fumbles along your chest and shoulders before tangling up in your hair and wrenching you back. The pain makes you wince for a moment before he assaults you with his tongue—sloppy and wet and hungry. Mostly he just licks and breathes heavily on your face and for a brief second you find yourself wondering if he’s always this brutish in bed, if you bring it out in him, or if it’s just been too long since he really let go and got lost in the baser acts. Then he strikes your prostate again and your thighs quiver and you whine against his tongue.

He chuckles breathlessly, full of pride, and instead of pulling back again, drives even deeper, gyrating his hips and using his free hand to pull apart your ass cheeks, trying to stuff in every last centimeter. “Think you’re—“ _thrust_ “so clever—“ _thrust_ “Don’t you?” _thrust_ “Well—“ _thrust_ “Bad little boys—“ _thrust_ “Don’t get to come.” He bites and sucks a huge mark into the corner of your jaw, slapping your ass and groaning loudly at the sound.

So maybe you’d been a little _too_ spot on with his kink, maybe he’d been so consumed by the act that his pillow talk had amounted to nothing but dirty words and condescending remarks. Still, you got him unhinged, so it’ll just take a little fine tuning to hit the right nerve next time, to get him loose enough not to mind his words, but still present to give out useful information. You feel tears prick in your eyes when he groans, low and wrecked, and spills himself deep inside your belly, twitching and jerking behind you, but keeping with his promise and not laying a hand anywhere near your leaking dick.

It’s gonna be a long night.

* * *

 

**Dean**

“Dean Campbell, you are incorrigible.” Cas is everything he remembers, everything he was dreaming of and hoping for. He, subconsciously, knows that the fond smile and the gentle fingers and the quavering voice are most likely an act, a skill that the fallen angel taught himself to sucker guys just like Dean, but at the moment, he just cannot find a fuck to give.

The other man’s brows are pinched tight and a frown puckers his lips, but his eyes are soft and his shoulders shake with a laugh when Dean tickles his ribs. “Mmm, Cas. You know it turns me on when you talk dirty to me.” Dean only lets go long enough to shrug off his leather jacket before hooking his hands right below the swell of Castiel’s ass, and lifting, lurching forward and using the momentum to toss the both of them into the armchair.

Cas bounces lightly, but clings to his neck and lets his legs fall open, breath hitching when Dean grinds down into him. “ _Someone_ missed me.” Dean simply hums in reply and starts nosing along the column of Cas’ throat, dipping his fingertips below the waist of Cas’ pants and smiling when he feels the soft cotton beneath.

“Aaand…. did you miss _me_?” Dean nips at the angel’s earlobe and traces up with the tip of his tongue. “Hm? Just a little? Just my sweet, sweet ass and my big, strong thighs?” Cas twists his head around to catch Dean’s lips for a slow, languid kiss before pulling back and locking their gazes. 

“Don’t all the girls?” His lids drop, his cheeks flush, and Dean can feel his palms clam up against his neck. “Swooning’s just a part of the package.” He chews the inside of his cheek and shrugs meekly. His eyes flick back and forth every few seconds, nervous, but still curious.

Dean sighs, sits back on his haunches, just breathing for a moment. Slowly, he starts to shed his shoes, his shirts, every damned article that shackles him to his life, until he’s naked, like he only can be for Cas. “Now, baby, I already said I was sorry for coming in a week late. We lost two guys Thursday last and I had to pick up their case. I woulda called, but for some damn reason, you can’t handle a cell phone.”

Cas ducks his head and smiles sheepishly, still only meeting Dean’s eyes for a brief second. “You admitted yourself, phone sex would only get you distracted.”

Dean narrows his eyes and purses his lips, trying his best not to smile right back. “ _That…_ is not the point. The point is that it wasn’t my fault, sure as hell wasn’t my choice, and that I woulda much rather been here, fogging up the windows with my favorite little boy blue.” At that, Dean resettles himself in Cas’ lap, burying his fingers in the angel’s dark hair and pressing their foreheads together. “Aint nowhere I feel more myself.”

* * *

 

It’s only later, when they’re covered in sweat and saliva and spunk, that Cas admits another man ate his pie.

Dean immediately feels jealousy turn toxic in his stomach and he clenches his fingers into Cas’ hips tight enough to leave bruises. He’s not stupid, not nearly as dimwitted as all his handlers think him to be. All those punk-ass Men of Letters, with their prim suits and strict codes, never did understand there was more than one way to be a clever guy. Still, doing favors for Cas, bringing him names and locations and sometimes fingers and bones never did feel like he was paying for it, never felt like anything but the only way Dean knew how to treat a person right. Most times it simply slipped his mind that the red light outside Cas’ door was more than just a beacon to call him home.

They’d talked about it before, about how, even if maybe Cas treated him differently, stopped asking for and expecting of, there were other men he didn’t feel that way about, couldn’t take in nor leave behind. Just as Dean always had to leave, had a need in his heart to keep other people safe and risk his life doing it, so Cas had a calling that made him do things nearly as unspeakable. Didn’t mean Dean had to like it, didn’t mean he didn’t occasionally have to teach a John a lesson, or drive him the hell outta dodge. Just meant, he kept his nose out of things he knew he wouldn’t like, and accepted this bed was never made just for two.

It was something he'd found himself able to live with. He'd always been a restless sort of guy, afraid of commitment like any red blooded American ought to be. With a country this vast and no reason to really ever have to grow up, none of the men or women in it were feeling any rush to take on unnecessary responsibilities, and Dean loved that. He was still skittish about wanting what he did when he let himself start loving Castiel, so it was a relief to be allowed to go away, to not have to tie himself to monogamy and think about what it meant to be a good, supportive partner.

But Dean was older now, more settled. Everything he owned was in this house besides his guns and the clothes he took out on hunts. He didn't give two fucks about anyone knowing he liked the rough and tumble of being with boys just as much as the silk and salaciousness of the ladies, and he hadn't been with anyone else besides his angel for years. He still went out on hunts, still felt the need to take his Baby out on long, long drives to places no one else wants to go, and Cas still collects broken people like a kid bringing in grounded birds. But that doesn't settle him anymore. It makes him itch for something different, something he doesn't know. He's not sure of what to do about it yet, but he's thinkin', and letting the status quo keep on until he's got it sorted.

Even so, this guy was new, and apparently didn’t know the rules about minding what wasn’t his. Though Cas hadn’t given him any information ‘sides his station as a handler (and teasingly, though Dean didn’t find it really all that funny, the ample size of his endowment), he was determined to find the bitch out and make an introduction. Dean didn’t need a fancy ass education to get his work done, and get it done right, and he sure as hell didn’t need a mutant dick to please his man, though in his opinion, what he was working with was nothing to scoff at either. He told Cas as much, and only felt his determination grow when the angel laughed softly and kissed him, long and slow.

The rest of the night was meant to be spent in silence, the both of them more than comfortable enough by now to share the same space with complete lack of inhibition or judgment, hence Dean’s belief that the need to call ‘Safety’ was completely obsolete and just too much effort when he was this blissed out. Cas didn’t quite agree, if the way he wrinkled his nose, and kicked at Dean’s shins as he rolled over to show his back, was anything to go by. “Dean! Really, what are you—five?”

He’s wondering if attempting a dutch oven would come out as childishly cute or just obnoxious, grabbing onto Cas’ shoulder and lifting up the sheets just in case, when he takes notice for the first time. It doesn’t hit him straight off what’s wrong, just the uncomfortable itch that something’s not where it’s supposed to be. Dean goes quiet, the amusement gone in an instant, as he tries to peg the cause of the sensation. Cas hasn’t noticed yet, a light-hearted tirade rushing in one ear and out the other.

And then it hits, when Cas realizes he’s been quiet for too long and turns to look over his shoulder. The inky feathers shimmer and shift and Dean can taste something acrid on his tongue. “ _Jesus,_ Cas. What did you get yourself into?” The angel looks worried for a moment, turning further to look Dean full in the face, but going stiff when the hunter’s hands hold him still, fingers tracing over his tell-tale marks. “How many did you lose?”

“That’s not of import.” Cas pulls away and grabs at the sheet, pulling it tight around his shoulder. Anger comes first, as it almost always does with Dean, but before he can do anything he’ll come to regret, concern washes over him, dowsing the flames and choking off his air.

“You gotta talk to me babe. What happened?” He reaches out, tentatively, but holds on firm when Cas doesn’t pull away. “Just—just promise me you weren’t in any danger. You promised… you promised you wouldn’t do anything stupid while I was away. I know I’m just a ‘fragile little human’ but I said I’d back you up and—“

“Dean!” Cas sits up and takes ahold of his hands, lacing their fingers together and pulling them into his lap. “I didn’t do anything stupid, well, at least I don’t think. There weren’t any fights, not really. I just… I got carried away. It doesn’t matter. I’m okay, you’re okay. That’s it, that’s all I need.”

Dean closes his eyes for a moment, breathes heavy and slow, before scooting forward, putting their heads together. “How can you say that’s not important? Cas, what happens when you run out, huh? All the evidence points to a relinquishing of grace. Every time you show off, every time you misbehave, you get a little more human.” For all that Dean says he’s no good with children, he’s got the I’m-not-angry-I’m-just-disappointed look down pat, and employs it liberally whenever Cas tries to push aside his worry.

“Who says that’s a bad thing?” Cas sighs before tilting his head, slotting their mouths together and kissing him, dry and sweet. “I can think of worse things.” Gently, he pushes Dean back down into the mattress, snaking a hand beneath the sheets and between the Hunter’s legs as he goes. “There’s even a few I’ve met that I don’t mind so much…” He smiles as he wriggles down between Dean’s legs and starts to suck raspberries on the inside of his thighs.

“Gee Cas, tell me how you really feel.” Dean rolls his eyes, even manages to huff indignantly, before Cas’ head disappears fully beneath the sheets and soft suckling sounds start to fill the air. “Th-this isn’t over yet y’know? You can’t—ah, fuck!—you can’t distract me with sex forever.”

The noises halt for just a moment as Cas pops back up, eyes gleaming. “Is that a challenge, Dean Campbell?” 

* * *

 

Needless to say, Dean’s late reporting in for assignment the next morning.

Authority figures never did sit well with him, and well, if shower sex with Cas just so happened to also mean pissing off the new boss, then it seemed he’d encountered his very first win-win situation. Expecting another painstakingly written, but shakily delivered speech from whichever pencil pusher they decided to shackle him to this time, he sure as hell wasn’t worried about any consequences.

Being in the line of work that he was, he should have known better, should have expected things to go exactly the wrong way-- namely not his. But, how exactly, does one see a thoroughly muscled sasquatch in a monkey suit coming? The guy’s something like seven feet tall—broad hands, big feet—Dean bristles. “You were due in an hour ago. I was beginning to think you’d already died before we even got started.” The asshole rolls his eyes and checks his clipboard, already turning away, dismissive.

“Look here limp dick—“

“We _really_ don’t have time for this. Reports of possessions in and around Topeka have been flooding in all morning. We’re not sure how many demons might have set down, but you’re to be on the next caravan out.” Without checking to see if Dean’ll follow, Sasquatch heads further into the bunker, stopping to peek in on every few stations, offering input, marking charts, giving commendations—the consummate brown-noser.

“I only just got here.” Dean tries not to let his disappointment and frustration seep into the words. Cas won’t be happy about him leaving without so much as a wave. “Don’t you have anyone else who can cover it? You haven’t even assigned me a partner.” Sasquatch stops, fucking _sighs_ , and turns back to look at him.

For a moment Dean doesn’t think he’s going to get an answer besides the stare, but then Sasquatch pinches the bridge of his nose, pushing up his glasses, and lets his shoulders slump. “I already checked the roster. You’ve had the most experience with demons out of everyone here—“ Dean can feel himself start to inflate, and though he could probably hold back the smug grin if he really tried, he doesn’t really want to. Sasquatch immediately takes notice and frowns, shaking his head. “—and you’ll be picking up your partner en route. Everything you need to know’s in this.” He hands over an accordion folder, stuffed to overflowing, and then marches back into an alcove off the main room—probably, Dean thinks, to the Cage. When Sasquatch comes back with two new kits, plastic seals still unbroken, he’s sure. Always good to know where the guns are kept.

* * *

 

Dean’s new handler introduced himself over earpiece once he’d already headed out to pick up his new partner. Sasquatch was actually named Sam and after losing his last two Hunters a little over a week ago, he was acting pretty squirrelly—even for a Man of Letters. Begrudgingly, Dean finds himself sympathizing.

It’s never easy to lose someone, especially in the line of work. You’re always left wondering if something could have been done differently, if it was just bad luck or timing, if it might have been your own fault. It’s the kind of thing that makes so many of them high functioning addicts—though the vice can vary from person to person. Drugs, drink, sex, work—too many give too much of themselves to just one thing, and it never does take too long for there to be a problem. No one really talks about it, but they all know it’s there.

Dean just offers his condolences, for once employing the manners his mother made sure he learned, and keeps quiet afterwards. He didn’t know the two that went down—only that they were young, fresh faced recruits who thought they were gonna make the world a better place. They’d even been promising, or so he’d heard. Smart, strong, good. But their intel was bad, they weren't prepared for what they hit. It was supposed to be a pretty routine hunt, and though no one really knows exactly how it happened, shit went sideways. A high level demon, they're thinking, the kind of archaic that makes it primal. Every day demons are fine, crossroads dealmakers are part of the training manual. They're most likely recently turned, they're well acquainted with human society, blend in well and interact seamlessly-- don't want to scare away their clients. They live in an almost symbiosis with humanity.

What those kids ran into? That was the “salt the earth and burn down cities” kind of creep, the great old things that waged wars and spoke in tongues and birthed abominations that tainted bloodlines for generations to come. No one knows how they found it, why it was there, where it went after it eviscerated them. The sheer amount of questions that nobody has answers to is astounding, something they usually don't encounter in an organization that makes it their life work to chronicle every second and every centimeter, and it's left a pall about the whole business. Everyone in the know is unsettled and watching their backs even closer than before.

The board said it wasn’t anyone’s fault, said no one could have seen it coming. No one was castigated and Dean was sent in with a few more veterans to clean the whole thing up. They didn’t recover any bodies, but he’d heard there was a funeral coming up soon, when the case was cleared with the Men Upstairs. He wondered if Sasquatch would be attending. It was never an easy decision, never easy to know if you’d be welcome or not. For just the moment, he decided to give the guy a break and cranked up the stereo, trying not to wish he was with Cas instead of driving out to the south side to pick up his new partner.

It was gonna be his first in years, and though Dean wished he could say he was pissed off about it, freelancing hadn’t really been working out for him. He was abrasive as it was, but always showing up on someone else’s case, feeling like he was butting in, getting treated like he was fucking internal affairs, didn’t lead to a great track record as far as cooperation goes. He always got the job done—always—but bruised egos and filed complaints followed him like mangy dog.

He pulled up outside a dilapidated duplex, double checked his papers to make sure this shit hole was the right place, and then laid on the horn. The grass was yellow or just plain dead, the air had that distinct mix of factory smog and sewer gas, and Dean was hoping, though not entirely certain, that the guy across the street was pissing off his front porch and not masturbating. He’d heard living outside the base was sketchy as hell-- after all it wasn’t like this job came with a salary and a pension-- but he’d always thought low-budget meant Cas levels of seedy housing, not middle-class ghetto.

He settled back into his seat and resolved to give this Charlie Bradbury dude another three minutes before he up and left— debating on whether or not that was enough time to give his angel a ring and let him know he’d be gone for a few days. Chewing on the inside of his cheek, Dean let out a slow, frustrated breath through his nose, and then muted his earpiece, plucking it out before Sasquatch figured out what he’d done and started ranting on about regulations.

He pulled out his latest burn phone, fresh from his new kit, and dialed the one and only number he had memorized. It rang five times before he picked up, Dean almost having given up, but smiling goofily when he heard the gruff, muffled “H’llo?” from the other side.

“Hey babe, you just getting out of bed? It’s almost noon already. If you’re that tired you should get to sleep earlier.” Dean found himself fiddling with the hem of his shirt, and immediately stopped, flushing at his own behavior.

“Well, whose fault is that, Mr. ‘It’ll just be a morning quickie!’ If forty-five minutes of shower sex is a quickie, I’d hate to see what it means when you take your time.” Dean can hear Cas’ voice go deeper with lust, and he can just picture the other man lying in bed, sheets caught around his ankles, free hand drifting down towards his pubic hair, eyes still half-closed from sleep.

It makes his jeans grow uncomfortably tight and he has to clear his throat a few times before he can respond. He double and triple checks out his window before licking his lips and pitching his voice low. “Oh, babe. You know I can go all night long. That what you want, huh? Laying on our sides, your ankle curled back around my ass, my fingers holding you open?” Cas moans softly across the receiver, breaking off into a sigh and Dean just _knows_ he’s started touching himself.

This is exactly why he never calls when he’s on a hunt.

Dean lets a hand drift down around his inseam, just teasing for a moment, as he spreads his legs as wide as the car will allow. “I’d fuck you slow and shallow, for _hours._ Just let my cock slip in and out of that sweet, little pucker.” Cas’ breath hitches and Dean finally lets himself touch the outline of his dick through his jeans. “I’d let you get good and fucking wet for me baby. You know how much I like it when you make slick.” Dean can feel a wet spot of his own forming on the denim near his crotch, remembering the first day Cas let him see just how alien angel physiology could be.

He’s the only one that’s ever tasted that hot fluid, ever fisted a hand in thick black feathers, ever had white, hot light burn against his tongue as Cas orgasmed. It doesn’t matter that Cas fell, he’s still not human, and when he let Dean see that, the Hunter had known he might just be in love. “I’d scratch your thighs, just like you like, and suck on your ear, and every time you came close, I’d twist your balls until you pulled back.”

Dean gives up on the pretense and full-on gropes himself through his clothes, breathing heavy as he throws his head back against the seat. Cas is making wet, mewling noises on the other end, and Dean wonders if he’s just tugging at his erection, or if he’s got his fingers pushing up inside of himself too. “I’d wait until we were both covered in sweat and slick and were shaking so hard we could barely stay upright. And then…” Dean trails off as he thumbs at his head and shudders at the tacky pre-come that sticks to the pad of his finger.

“Then?” Cas’ voice is raw and eager and a full octave lower than usual. It makes Dean quiver and he’s so close to creaming his pants like a goddamned teenager, but he just doesn’t care. He lets the heavy silence sit for a moment, punctuated by their mirrored heavy breathing and the occasional lewd squelch on Cas’ side.

“Then I’d kiss you and—“ Dean startles when there’s a knock at the window, and freezes with his hand palming his dick. A red-headed woman is peering through the glass with wide, horrified eyes and somehow, he knows that this is the Charlie he was waiting for, knows that this is his brand new partner, fresh from academy training. Dean chokes when he hears Cas coming loudly in his ear, screaming his name.

Really, he should have anticipated his first day back full-time going this badly.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Sam**

Sam’s thankful when Dean and Charlie finally settle down for the night, a roach motel halfway to Topeka their resting point for the moment. The two of them have a lot to work out, and Sam could sense a tense awkwardness between them both through his line. He’s not sure if it’s just the usual jitters or if there’s a chemistry problem he didn’t anticipate, but he couldn’t get either of them together. It’s a shame, really. He’d thought they’d work well together—goofy and unconventional and invested.

Honestly though, the biggest concern is the paperwork he’ll have to file if they can’t work it out. He doesn’t really know either of them well enough to miss one, or be disappointed in their character, but he knows how bad it’ll look if he screws up right out of the gate, so soon after his last mistake. There’re not a lot of people in their line of work, and Dean’s just about burned every bridge he’s come across. Sam’s not entirely sure there’s another partner out there for him if he can’t get his act together.

But for the moment, he tries to tuck it all away, letting the anxiety go—knowing that he’ll just be back in the thick of it tomorrow when the two of them get back on the road. For now, while he has a moment, he has to focus on himself, and try and get his affairs back in order before they hurt someone else. Sam sighs heavily as he steps out of his car and onto the gravel path, double checking to make sure he’s still got that manila envelope tucked into his inside jacket pocket. It sits heavy there, heavier than it probably should, and he can’t stop himself from worrying the edges, sick that what it contains could prove fatal—hopefully only for himself.

He runs nervous hands through his hair as he walks up the steps, but hesitates as he’s about to knock, turning his ear as a soft tune floats over from the backyard. Hesitating a moment, Sam takes several false starts before adjusting his glasses and stepping off the porch, hand trailing the side of the house as he follows the sound. Describing what he comes to as a yard would be overly generous—bristling weeds and dry dirt taking prominence, standing in stark contrast to the healthy herbs and flowers spilling out of the window boxes hanging nearby.

Castiel is standing at the center of a square of wire lines, wicker basket full of clothes at his feet and a wooden pin clenched between his teeth. He himself is only wearing a pair of ankle socks with a hole over one big toe and a pair of boxer briefs so small they leave nothing to the imagination. He doesn’t notice Sam at first, keeps moving along the line as he hangs up henley shirts and over-stretched sweaters next to his lacy lingerie, humming that same tune from the first time. He pauses every few seconds to grab a new pin from where they’re clamped around the waistband of his underwear and Sam can’t help the way his heart flutters a little at the image.

Then Castiel turns around and the fantasy is shattered—the deep black wings spread along his back and down his arms reminding Sam why he’s here. He clears his throat, straightens his tie, and steps out into the open, smiling wanly when Castiel notices and greets him warmly. “Sam! Back so soon, and during the day no less.” The angel’s smile isn’t as sly as the words imply it should be and Sam finds himself frowning at the dissonance. “Come by for a pick-me-up?”

Castiel steps forward, weaving through the damp clothes, and insinuating himself into Sam’s personal space. “No actually.” Sam smiles tight-lipped and feels a little thrill of pride when a look of confusion crosses the other man’s face. “Business today, not pleasure.” Sam takes the envelope from his jacket, folded in half, and turns it over and over in his hands, smoothing out the crease. “This should be more than enough for our two visits, enough to buy my freedom and your discretion.”

Sam offers the envelope up, looking at Castiel’s shoulder instead of his eyes, making sure to keep some distance. But he doesn’t feel Castiel take it from him, doesn’t register any movement, and starts to feel uncomfortable as the silence stretches between them. He thinks that he should be afraid of this reaction, that he should probably be running over escape routes in his head just in case, but instead he just feels chastised and lowers his head further.

“What? Isn’t this what you wanted?” Sam shoves the envelope at Castiel’s chest again and flinches when it’s ripped from his grasp. The rustling of paper is harsh as the angel tears the package open and glances through the pages, crinkling them in his hands as he is too rough, too rushed.

“This is sufficient.” His voice is devoid of all emotion as Castiel stiffly folds the papers up into a small square and fingers at its edges. “You’re free to leave now, since you can hardly stand to be near me.” Without a backward glance, he starts marching back to the house, leaving his half-empty basket. “Must’ve been a real chore to stick it in something so vile.” His back door slams as he heads inside.

Sam finds his ears burning and his stomach roiling and though he fully intends to just leave it at that, to admit it was all a stupid mistake and accept his just desserts, he finds himself following after, his feet flying across the hard ground without his consent. He’s gentle as he drifts inside, steps out of his shoes, and tosses his jacket across the kitchen counter. He can hear water running in a room to the left and walks to the doorway, knocking tentatively at the wood, but not pushing it open.

For a few long moments there’s no reply, but Sam just knocks again and fiddles with the band of his watch. “What do you want Sam?”

Suddenly, Castiel sounds so immeasurably tired—a complete turnaround from the sunny disposition just minutes before. Sam finds himself hating that he was the reason for it all and leans against the wood paneling, dejected. His head thunks softly when he lets it drop against the wall, searching for an honest answer to the question. It takes him long enough that the water stops running and Castiel pulls the door open himself, standing naked on the other side of the doorjamb. “I don’t know.”

Sam shrugs, feeling small and stupid and young like he hasn’t for years, and lets himself be corralled into the small bathroom. The shower and tub are separate—to the right and left of the sink and toilet anchored in the middle, respectively—so he throws his clothes into the dry basin after he lets Castiel undress him. They walk hand in hand to the edge of the tub before Castiel pushes him forward first, hands light, but teasing against his ass.

He sinks into the water with an appreciative hiss, the itching burn only lasting a few seconds as his skin adjusts. Sam scoots forward when Castiel places a guiding hand on his shoulder, and sighs amusedly as the angel slides in tight against his back, legs bracing his ribcage. Sam goes along with whatever instructions Castiel gives, legs too long for the model, but comfortable still as he lies back against the angel’s chest.

Little shivers run down his shoulders as Castiel smooths back his hair, plucks his glasses off his face, and presses his toes into Sam’s thighs. They kiss, skewed and upside down and sloppy, but don’t chase the arousal, even as Sam’s erection bobs up above the surface, and Castiel’s presses hard against his back. They stay until the water gets cold and even after that, tracing patterns into each other’s skin and simply not speaking. 

* * *

 

Sam decides to stay the night against his better judgment, sitting with a towel around his waist in Castiel’s living room while watching a cop procedural. In the background he can hear the angel cooking, and he tries not to let himself believe that this is anything other than desperate, lonely people spending the night together instead of alone. He’s not even really sure angels are capable of baser emotions, all accounts in the Men of Letters history having said they were ruled by a strict set of laws and code of morals they never deviated from. They all had this notion of being… predetermined, of want having nothing to do with anything.

Though he can’t be sure the same thing applies to fallen angels, those who have lost touch with their brethren and God, Sam doesn’t presume to think that they’re all that different, that Castiel isn’t working towards some grand end game here. Still, as much as he knows he should be keeping his head about him, that he should let go of this odd affinity he has for the other man, he can’t stop himself from doing rash things. He’s only human.

Downing the dregs of his second beer, Sam chews the inside of his cheek and shifts restlessly in his seat, fingering lightly at the soft hairs on his stomach before standing up, and letting the towel slip from around his hips. Trying to be as nonchalant about himself as Castiel always is, and probably failing miserably, he gets himself another drink from the fridge and leans up against the counter top, eyes still on the television. 

Castiel stops chopping vegetables for a moment, quirking his eyebrow at Sam and only barely holding back a smirk, before chuckling and heading right back into his preparations. It doesn’t take long for Sam’s attention to wander, and he finds himself amazed at just how comfortable Castiel seems in his own skin, moving about without the slightest sense of awareness or shame about his body, not even when he stops to scratch his asscheek with a wooden spoon.

It’s the kind of ‘normal’ Sam only ever thought existed in books and he finds himself so badly wanting to be a part of it. Quirking his lips, he moves around the counter and starts to help out—familiar enough with the concept of chicken, vegetables, and rice that he feels he can contribute something to the meal. It takes a conscious effort, but he tries not to censor himself, not to stop himself from something because it isn’t appropriate or might be strange.

Castiel encourages it when he notices. With little smiles and soft noises of amusement, eyes twinkling when Sam starts making sound effects, tossing vegetables in the pan from five feet away; nose wrinkling, but shoulders shaking with a laugh every time he catches Sam unconsciously handling his balls (which is just about every other time he looks over); teeth catching on his bottom lip as Sam sways his hips to the music on commercials.

It’s very nearly unbearably domestic and Sam feels a sense of contentment sparking in his chest at the notion. They goof around, touch and kiss, tease and share. Sam eats his dinner on the floor in front of the TV while Cas perches on the counter behind him, just as engrossed in the game show re-run as he is. They stay up too late, catching the news and then trading lazy handjobs while celebrities get interviewed by some late night host Sam can’t remember the name of. Once his head hits the pillow, Sam has forgotten all about his intentions when he came here, the gaping void that drove him to the house in the first place, and about the job he’ll still have to do come morning.

* * *

 

There weren’t any awkward goodbyes or self-conscious handshakes like Sam thought there was going to be, on the account of Castiel sleeping like the dead and not even breaking the rhythm of his snores when Sam got out of bed and dressed in the morning. He’s not really sure whether he’s upset about it or not, only knows that he’s felt a kind of off all day that can only be ascribed to the non-encounter it started off with. He likes to tell himself that it’s just because he didn’t get properly strung out yesterday—that because he’s so used to being left _wrecked_ by Castiel after their visits, only getting a rub and tug didn’t sate his need—and now his brain is all cottony with being turned on by the sex, but not satisfied completely.

It’s a jackass’s preferred excuse and though Sam doesn’t usually lower himself to the sort of behavior that his charges often engage in, right now it’s the easiest thing to grasp for and all he really wants to be reasoning. Everything else just makes his pulse quicken in an uncomfortable way and his palms sweat and his body set off alarms that swear everyone at base knows—can see that he’s been fucking around with an angel in the way he walks and talks and acts.

It’s not like he’d be punished for it. Sure, there’s rules against that sort of thing: you’re never supposed to stick your dick in an unknown, just to be sure they’re not feeding off your lust or loneliness or plain old flesh, but everyone does it. It’s all swept under the rug, not mentioned in certain company, left to implications in the work place and not much else. And besides, having a not-so-benign fascination with a fallen angel isn’t really on the same level as getting hot and heavy with a witch that snitches for you.

Angels are the big leagues. Angels are enough to make the Men Upstairs take interest. If they knew about Cas, they would surely want him captured, want him brought to base and questioned and tested and depending on his behavior, maybe even dissected. They try not to bring it up too much, especially not in Academy, but the history of hunters and Men of Letters alike isn’t exactly wholesome.

How else would they have such a stockpile of information on every beast known to man? How else are you supposed to know exactly what hurts them and how? Experimentation. Trial and error. They know these things because the early brotherhood sat and hashed them out over the course of generations—capture and torture and catalogue. Stashes of dead man’s blood and powdered vampire fangs and sloughs of shifter skin have to come from somewhere. It’s not practiced as much anymore, mostly because they tell themselves that they’ve become more cultured, that every group in history had their dark times in a darker world—look at the crusades and the inquisition!—but everyone knows it’s just because there’s no longer the necessity.

They have the stores that the hunters keep replenished. They have the information on what makes everything tick. They have everything they need. But if there were something new? Something undocumented that had eluded study for thousands and thousands of years? Of course the mantle would be taken up again and no one would step in to say a word against it, not that Sam thinks anyway. They’d probably be too busy trying to cover their own asses, because if the Men Upstairs knew that a whole bunker was keeping this secret, that a fallen angel was being squirreled away by their own? Retribution would be swift.

So when Dean gets back on the com and jovially asks what Sam got up to last night, he simply talks about the chicken the television and the tub, and somehow forgets to mention that there was another person there for all of it. He can practically hear Dean’s mocking derision and rolled eyes in his earpiece, but chooses to let it go because he knows exactly how the other man’s night went and it definitely wasn’t shared with a blue eyed boy that can make every muscle in your body ache, and besides, he doesn't have anything to prove to men like Dean anymore. He's seen his fair share of shit, been down in the gutter just as much as any hunter, so let the guy think what he wants about him now, Sam isn't the sheltered, self-centered academic everyone wants to believe.

They _should_ make it to the epicenter of the possessions no later than early evening and that’s when Sam will have something actually constructive to do—cross-referencing and pulling up records and making note of every piece of evidence they come across—but until then he’s pretty much stuck staring at paperwork and wondering what Cas is doing right at that moment, if he bakes things other than pies, if he’d make Sam a soft, yellow custard and sit in his lap while he fed it to him, smiling with his eyes as he dabbed some on his nose and breathed thin when he licked it off.

* * *

 

**Castiel**

There’s a reason you came out here in the first place, a reason why you would put yourself in danger by living so close to a bunker when you never knew if a john would change their mind and turn you in—tired of the terms and conditions of your relationship. You had a lead, a parting gift from your father, even when he didn’t want you to go. That’s what’s always been so great about Bobby—he just saw the need in people and knew how to quiet its incessant hum. And he always did it without production, with some muttered words and a folded up piece of paper and a hug so tight it might have cracked a regular human’s ribs. You've tried your whole life to take after him like that.

Turns out your old man wasn’t just some gruff, kindly junk farmer more open-minded than most. He’d taken you in and fostered you up because he knew exactly what you were and exactly what would happen to you if he let you go. You’d taken this news without any of the fanfare that a usual adoption confession inspired in others, but at first it did sting—to know that he took you out of obligation and not because he’d seen a small boy that he immediately loved and wanted. Of course that familial affection came quick enough, but it was more than a measure of disconcerting to know that that was all just luck.

Whatever the thorns, the plant bore fruit and you found out your father had connections, that all those dirtied men and women that stopped in from time to time for rest and food and first aid were actually hunters and you were the only permanent resident in a halfway house since Bobby took it over from its last caretaker. And many years past there was another like you, but utterly unlike you that passed by. He was powerful and frank so immense he made the room shrink with his presence. Bobby said you could tell that he didn’t have the same upbringing, but not like he was a feral child-- like maybe he never actually forgot who he was, or maybe Heaven’s Host never stopped tuning in.

In all your research, there’s been rumors to corroborate this—that when angels fall it isn’t always the same. They’re sent down for different reasons, meted out different punishments, and some get more battered and beat up along the way. Some came down with their wings still fully physical—a punishment or a blessing, it’s not sure. The joy of flight is something you somehow find yourself missing though you’ve never experienced it, and you know that angel couldn’t hide for long. Her plumaged appendages currently hang in a Men of Letters base somewhere down south. Still some others could see souls and so was borne the idea of reading auras, and some still could hear their siblings chatter and went mad for not being able to talk back.

You think you must not have done anything awful wrong or maybe you just weren’t worth the effort. Either way, you’re glad for what you consider your normalcy—the only pressing concern the dwindling, tattered and furled feathers that slide along your back, the image always changing despite the promise ink set into skin should hold. Gadreel tuts as he runs his fingers along the lines, his face so tight you’d think he was furious if that wasn’t how he always looked.

He always seems so distinctly otherworldly, so separate from what you are, though you’re supposed to be one and the same. The glass atrium at the entrance of his garden houses plants so exotic you’re not sure they’re supposed to bloom on Earth, let alone the Midwestern Americas, and the peculiar pigments of the petals make the kohl obscuring the upper half of his face that much more shocking, more devastating in its starkness. It makes his eyes an otherworldly sort of green that they might not be on their own and gives the off putting illusion that they are always following you. “You should be more careful brother, humans are more dangerous than they first appear to be. Their appetites are limitless and insatiable and they have a habit of consuming others in their quest to slake it.”

His voice is not half so deep as yours, but sounds older, like it is used to another language and must hesitate a moment around this inferior tongue. His diction and pacing and even tone suggest that he is tired of words, even as he has not used them for near a millennia. At least, that is what you think, and seeing as how you’re not sure he talks to anyone aside from you, you choose to believe that that’s what matters. You shrug as he continues to search the pattern as though he can discern meaning from it and stare out the bits of glass not shrouded by foliage, taking note of the grey day and hoping Dean took a jacket. He gets cold terribly easily and usually wears an astonishing amount of layers since he isn’t fond of overcoats, but he’s also forgetful in a rush and very probably left half of what he needs in his room at the bunker.

“You do not find a fondness for their recklessness, even now?” you ask on a wistful sigh, thinking of both the men that have currently occupied the majority of you time. Sam is quite the exquisite wreck of a person and you know that Gadreel would squidge his eyes in disapproval at just an hour spent in his company. He wouldn’t get how beautiful it is that he’s got himself in such a dysfunctional tangle, but still keeps on, still gets up every day and tries his best, looking to be better. There’s a kind of strength in that—in ignoring all the signs that say you can’t possibly make it and try anyway.

Gadreel makes a noise of derision and the tenseness of his fingers tighten against your skin for a moment before he lets a deep breath out of his nose and the pressure dissipates. “You steep yourself too long in their company, Castiel. They will infect you, like they infect each other. Can’t you see the way they drip ripples into every other being they touch? Every action, every word bears a consequence that lives inside the other for eternity, forever altering their path.”

“Yes, but isn’t that what’s so amazing about them? Both as individuals and as a race?” You twist your head to look over your shoulder and huff when Gadreel tips his eyes up to glare at you, brows furrowing for a second before one of his hands reaches up to turn your chin back away. “They’re always changing. flowing like mercury from one thing to the next, always in some in between state and never landing on a single fixation for too long. They are all interlocking pieces of each other, but do not live and move as a hive mind—as the Host.”

“You speak as though you remember, as though you could possibly compare the two.” There’s almost an inflection there, almost a tipping to let you know if Gadreel himself does, but it’s gone in the space of a second, before you could possibly hope to read it. He steps away from you then, without saying anything about his assessment-- whether because he has nothing to actually say or because he no longer wishes to share it with you, you're not sure. Either way, there's a clear tenseness in the air that lets you know he's not keen on discussing this topic at the moment-- not that he ever has been, or ever might be. You could push, try and force him to engage with you, but all that's ever succeeded in doing before is making him angry-- and Gadreel has a wrath inside of him that's anything but human.

“Well I may not remember anything of our time before, but I don't really have to,” you mutter as you stand and cross to one of the long, tile-topped tables lining the edges of the room. The porcelain is old and yellowed, painted patterns on it disrupted by interlocking spiderweb fractures. None of them are missing, and few have chips larger than the point of a corner, making the pieces seem less like decrepit and more like antiqued, though the line is fine at that. Dirt from the potted plants sitting atop and around them has filled in the small valleys of grout and become just as much a part of what's holding them in place as the cement that was originally poured for it. Some vines spill out of their pots to continue obscuring whatever tableau covers the surface and your eye is always drawn away from the art laid underneath by the bright flora above.

You rub the petals of one of the plants between your fingers, staring into the blood-red center of it-- the stamen unsettling in the same hue, with their motes of flaking pollen-- swearing that the gathered dew drops look like someone's life was given to feed the foliage instead of just a spritz of fertilized water. His whole place is like this-- emanates an otherworldly feedback that makes your skin feel like it's stretched too tight over your frame. Gadreel likes to pretend no one notices, but it's all here for a reason. _H_ _e's_ here for a reason, you know.

“I don't know what I did-- none of us ever do-- but what could have been so bad as to curse me to this? This fear and hatred that has followed me all my life and found its home behind my chest?” You grit your teeth as you think of it-- how you've known even before you were told, that you were different-- how every moment has been fragile so that you don't break and become something to revile. “Ever since I was just a kid, I've had to be careful of everything, or it could be over-- and not quick and painless, but horribly. Death only ever comes for us on a dirge, as this specter that claws and tears. And even after our release, where do we go from there? Why should we know what befalls the humans and not ourselves? I can't believe that a people who would mete out this fate as a form of punishment would possibly be one that I could ever find a home in.”

You sigh deeply as your fingers tighten against the flesh of the flower, bruising it enough to feel its sugars stick to the pads and release a concentration of its aroma. Gadreel should be the one person that understands this, should be the person who would listen and know and help to shoulder the heaviness of this burden and yet-- yet you find yourself more afraid to reveal it to him than just about anyone. Somehow he does not fear this, does not find his horrors or his struggles by this hunt, even as he lives at the epicenter of a city filled with people who would turn him in and cut him up the moment it was worth their while. And he's done so, for years.

The other angel has no answer for the question that wasn't asked-- as is so often the case with their visits-- his shoulders high and tight as he touches his hand to the sweated pane of glass in front of him. The outside can't be seen through the greenhouse windows, and yet he stares, as though that world is just before him, and it's one he hasn't understood for as long as he might have existed. You find yourself wondering if he's ever felt comfort anywhere, if he's ever truly found a home. If he rebelled enough to be sent down here, he can't have been happy in heaven, and yet-- yet there seems to be nothing he wants here, nothing he seeks, even as he makes moves, even as he keeps secrets and holds cards.

You cross over to your clothes as he lets the silence stretch, the way he so often does, his words only ever used sparingly. An old, ribbed tanktop of Dean's with a hole over the navel and engine oil stains along the hem lays in a pile together with a long sleeved shirt whose collar falls off your shoulders and a canvas jacket with more pockets than you know what to do with. Inside one of them is the folded and wrinkled, worried and waterstained pages that Sam gave, that you've read and studied and interpreted a thousand ways to Sunday, but all the pieces still come out the same.

You think on them as you slide each article on, smelling at Dean's sweat and the probably imagined notes of his cologne as the first layer shifts against your skin, tucking your face to the side to feel the shoulder strap against your mouth even as the second shirt covers the rest. The Men of Letters first came here when the city was new, when the infrastructure was all low to the ground and the roads only went in and out instead of between and through. There weren't so many people then. The houses were laid out where it was pleasant, not where they fit the grid, and the fields where the crops grew over your head were kept as far out the bounds as possible, known to house things worth fearing.

Because weird things happened here. Still do.

The oddities came in sets, in patterned timings that drew the attention of those armored cultists when their organization was brand new. They hadn't figured out the meaning of them yet, just knew that strange was what they were looking for and the what and the why of those instances would come next. But as they rooted out inconsistencies and evils, the signs never dissipated, never even took notice, and so they stayed. It's the story of just about how every bunker they've dug into the landscape goes, but this one's altered, this one's missing a beat that you're not sure anyone else has noticed. Sam may have started smiling when he kisses you, but he wouldn't have given up something this important if he knew that it was. He's a company man through and through and no amount of pleasurable ass is gonna put a dent in that. 

You have to assume that he missed it, that they've been missing it-- or at least that it's been overlooked in their haste to continue to catalog and cremate the bone structure of everything else there is. Unless it's a trap. Unless you're not half so clever as you think and Sam Winchester is a better player than you thought. He's hard to gauge, hard to catch every facet of. There's things you're not seeing, faces hidden beneath the shine and glare of others. But is it subterfuge or just secrets? Everyone squirrels away something about themselves, everyone want to keep just a few things.

You frown as you turn and pull your arms into the sleeves of the jacket, looking at all the plants that shouldn't exist here and still somehow thrive. The air is different-- the atmosphere they process made into something more than oxygen, something with a weight that's not just chemicals. They have a density, each of them. They push and pull at unseen fabrics and wrinkle the world in ways that you can't see or touch, but feel, somewhere in you. 

“There's something here. There's some reason we're both in this place.” Your steps are hesitant as you move forward, feeling every ounce of that extra gravity as you approach your brother, as you see the creature in him that others see in you. “I know that you know it. Maybe you're not sure what it is or why it is, but don't lie to me and tell me that you haven't noticed. You're manipulating it, probably in ways that I haven't even realized yet.” He hasn't moved. He hasn't even really given any indication that he's heard you. His palm has made a condensated print against the glass now, the moisture in this room clinging to everything. “You know things. You can read my wings. You can see the threads of us, I feel it every time we talk. You know what's going to happen to me, what has to the others, what's coming for you. You have no fear of it and yet you won't share that knowledge.”

You're nearly close enough to touch him now, staring at the sharp slope of his shoulders, seeing the joints that move-- shrug in a remembered shape that no longer rests its weight there. Everything he does, everything he is, is more than just muscle memory and phantom limb from beyond this physicality like you feel yourself. He doesn't behave like he grew up in this body, like he learned how to walk and talk in it, like he felt its growing pains and outlasted its awkwardness. He's not like you. “Why won't you talk to me?”

You reach your hand out to grasp at him, to turn him around and make him look at you, make him lie to your face, but he snaps out faster than any snake, catches you with a strength that's more than any predator. He's not even on the food chain. He helped make it. He holds your wrist in a way that doesn't hurt, but could snap the bone with a just a thought, and his expression is cold and calculating as it examines your own. His eyes flit across your face not like a man searching your soul, but in that alien, sideways attention that a bird gives when you've caught its interest.

“Do not be discontent with what you have, Castiel. Greed is a deadly sin and you do not want to know our end half so much as you think.” Gadreel grits his teeth and wrinkles his nose, like the thunder before the downpour, warning you to rush away from the storm. “Go back to those boys that worship at your feet and find your curiosity sated in how to keep them.” He throws your wrist away from himself like he is afraid to have touched it as long as he has, taking a step away and toward the door inside. “Curious minds beget regretful hearts and there's no need for yours to be tainted so.”

He sounds as considerate as he is contemptuous, never wholly of one thing, never someone that you can just take at face value. It's been like this since you met, ever tenuous and all so contestant. You can never really tell if he's your ally or your adversary, and it always makes you feel more alone than if there weren't any other angels on this continent at all. “You can't hide this way from me forever. You can't shut me away in a box . Protecting me, caging me, whatever you think you're doing, I'll find a way around it. You can't make these decisions for me, not when I don't even know what they are!”

You clench your hands into fists as he keeps his back to you, pausing at the door frame. His tone is inscrutable, his voice barely heard as he simply murmurs, “You're so alike sometimes, I forget--” His body loosens up for just a split second, just enough to make him seem tired. His hand grasping at the frame taps at the weathered wood in stuttered, halting gestures and then he's stepping across the threshold and you're left to see yourself out, more lost than you were before the visit.

Your nerves are fried, your eyes feel hot, your heart is racing. You pull out your burner and call up Sam. You need a hit and he's the best fix within reach.

* * *

**Dean**

Early mornings are never something Dean enjoyed or even really got used to, but just accepted as a part of his life. Most monsters move in the night, so you only have by daylight to figure out what and where they are, and how you're going to kill them. Each move into sunset feels like a race against time to try and make sure another murder isn't the next set of clues, and so showering while the light is still grey and wiping gathered dew from community benches to sit and eat a fast food breakfast isn't so much a choice as it is a necessity. 

Charlie looks just as chipper as ever as she bites into a croissan-which, bobbing her head either to an imagined tune or just by natural, frenetic need, Dean's not sure, but he finds it immediately irritating over his bag of grease, peppered with the occasional hash-brown round. Cas sleeps like the dead and it's usually only the smell of the breakfast Dean's made him, sitting on a plate in his naked lap, that makes him emerge from his nest of blankets. He tends to worm his head out of some unseen hole in the swaddle to lay his cheek on the freckled inside of Dean's thigh so he can catch a tater-tot with his tongue and start munching himself into wakefulness. 

Those body warm trappings-- scratchy from their years of use and cheapness, but comfortable still in the broken in, lived in, loved over way that really matters-- are what he's thinking of as he stares at the clouds that left night time rain, but seem to clear with the dawn. Dean's carefully cultured broodiness from yesterday's awkward tension starts to break at just the memory of it-- the gentle burn of Cas's untended scruff, the salt of their breakfast-greasy kisses-- and a reluctant smile spills onto his lips. He gives a happy grunt into his coffee as she takes notice and smiles back, not caring that she doesn't know why his mood suddenly turned.

She's not a bad kid-- not half so annoying as every other partner Dean had before. She don't pick at her teeth near constantly, don't cook shit in spoons in the bathroom at night, don't touch what isn't hers or ask questions she shouldn't. That's what matters. The work is what matters. There are lives at stake, there's people to protect, and she hasn't forgotten that yet in the mire of her own curated tragedy. Every hunter has their story, has their case that made them break, and she's new enough to not even be aware of that yet. It's good, to a point. She's not fatalistic yet, doesn't fuck up while trying to cope, doesn't scope the usual patterns or believe she already knows everything there is. She just-- she's always so ready to go. Like this is still an adventure.

“Now listen here,” he starts out, speaking what might be the first words that he's uttered for the past twenty hours. “Demons at a time like this aren't really something the Men Upstairs should have let you start with. They're some nasty shit and they don't have any qualms about their prey. There's only three things you need to know to make sure that we both come out of this alive.

One-- most demons are here to make deals. They're not out for the gore or the chaos, they want folks' souls. They look for talent, they look for purity, and they want to corrupt it. They need bits of humanity to twist, to play with. They'll sooner try to talk you into something you don't realize is fucked than fight for it. They're smart, they can see into parts of you that you didn't know were there, and they're ruthless.

Two-- They'll vamoose any time you back them into a corner. They're not like the beasts we hunt that'll fight till they're dead. They know when the tables are turning against them and they don't mind having to retreat and find a better tactic. You have to know your passages like you know the back of your hand, cuz they ain't gonna wait for you to fumble with a book before they break their bodies down and try to escape. You've got just a few seconds while they're turning immaterial, but the second they're not solid, you're screwed.

Three-- They're all in service to someone. Hell's got a hierarchy and a cause. Sometimes different demons have conflicting interests, but there's always a higher up that's pulling the strings and you can figure out how to beat your minion if you've got intel on the head honcho. They're afraid of their bosses and they have can's and cannot's. Work those angles, get them against the ropes. Talking them down is just as good as forcing them out, because a demon's never gone for good anyway. All we can ever do is send them back downstairs for a while.”

Halfway through the instruction, Charlie pulled a notebook out of her jacket pocket, fumbling with her breakfast in one hand and scrawling in pen with the other. Dean had managed to not roll his eyes at that-- barely-- but they both give a huff when the meat and eggs slide from between the breading to slop onto the ground, staring at the wasted food with sad eyes and an unspoken, but shared regret.

Dean shakes his head and wipes his hand across his mouth as he stands, crumpling up his garbage as she continues to stare at the half of her meal that can never be recovered. A worn, wooden rosary clacks against itself where the cross taps at the beads when he moves-- the length of it wrapped around his wrist in a manner he'll never understand to make it clasp. It's one of Cas' and he never lets Dean leave the house without it when he knows the mark's hell-made.

Dean can't really muster up the faith to find comfort in the imagery, but he does take solace in knowing his angel is looking out for him, and knowing it'll bless water enough to burn the suckers if they make a move. Each bead has been worn into a more oblong shape with the years of worried fingers working against them, and Jesus' feet have been chipped off the end, but that somehow makes it feel more authentic than the perfect, engraved silver pieces that are all tangled in a box in the trunk. 

Charlie's eyes are finally stolen away from her breakfast when she notices it, and though it's easy to see the curiosity in her features, she's smart enough to see there's something personal behind it and she hasn't yet earned the right to ask. “So where do we start?” she says instead, mashing her soggy croissant halves into a ball to pop into her mouth as she follows along with the clean up, hugging her jacket tight against the chill that probably pervades her slight frame much more than it does Dean's acquired husk.

“Well, we gotta find who called the demon here in the first place-- who's been messing around at crossroads. If they've already made their deal, we'll wanna search for a strange uptick in success-- someone making a name for themselves when they hadn't been worth much before. If they haven't, then it's gonna be a lot harder. We'll find the thing faster in the first case, but then someone's soul will already be fucked, so--” He shrugs a shoulder and tips his head, not minding the shocked look he gets in reply.

No one's got time to dodge around ugly truths in the business and it's best that she isn't coddled. No one's going to take care of or baby sit her and at the very least, Dean isn't gonna be mean about it. Sure, he's gonna throw her right into the deep end, but there's really no other choice. This isn't a restless spirit they can research the hell out of beforehand and take a measured practice swing at when they're ready. Demons move fast and hit hard and he's found himself wanting her to succeed.

He wipes his hands on the seat of his jeans and motions for her to follow, pulling out a couple of coins to buy every local newspaper from the metal vendor next to the bus stop and splitting them up between the two of them. The study was never his favorite part of the job, and he could easily ask his handler to do it for them, twice as fast with his training no doubt, but he hasn't bothered to put his earpiece in for today, and luckily Charlie seems to be mirroring him without question. Sam will definitely ream him out when he eventually does have to check in, but for now havin' a pencil pusher breathing down his neck isn't going to help anyone, and so it doesn't seem like such a big deal to break protocol for a little while.

* * *

 

Nothing. There's fucking nothing. No strange weather patterns, no crop blights, no strange markings or violent deaths or strange instances of anything. The biggest news of the past month has been the local bar switching from bone-in to boneless wings, which has apparently caused quite the uproar. This town is more boring than the underside of a rock-- there aren't even any potato bugs to help off their back.

“So what do we do now? If base confirms that there were sightings, but we can't actually find signs of it, where does the discrepancy lie? Even if we'd missed the demon's presence, they would have left indicators that they'd been there. We've literally combed down every sidewalk at an intersection and every inch of dirt at the mapped crossroads, and there hasn't even been sulfur. Demons don't cover their tracks and a regular human making a deal wouldn't know what to hide. So is it someone who's been through the rounds before? And if they have, how did they make it out alive?”

She's been rattling off these questions all day long and Dean wants to get pissed at her for it, but they're the exact same things that he's been thinking. This doesn't add up. There's some kind of disconnect in the system and he doesn't really know where it's coming from or what it means. He leans up against the wall as he chews his lip and stares out the motel window to the large field across the street, listening to her fingers frantically fly over a keyboard, though he has no idea what's left to be looking up. There's no information to cross reference, no obscure lore to uncover or define, no hidden motive behind the people to piece together. It's a blank slate and it's more unnerving than all the other displays of cruelty and power he's come across before.

He thinks she can feel his unease in the way her eyes strain at the screen-- as though she can will a clue into existence with the sheer force of her hope-- and her usual chatter has increased in speed but decreased in fervor, hours away from being intent mutterings to herself about topics so tangential the original line of questioning can't be parceled.

Dean knows what he's gonna have to do, knows there's only one resource that he hasn't burned up yet. Doesn't mean he has to be excited about it or take less than his sweet time getting to it. He sighs as he steps away from the view and crosses the high traffic carpet to their duffels, digging through until he finds his kit, and then pulling his ear piece from it. The oddly formed hardware sits uncomfortably in the shape of his ear-- always has-- and he makes a face as he wedges it in tight enough to stay in on its own and then brings up the cuff-mic, clearing his throat loudly into it in the hopes of giving his handler a start.

“Ah, the lone wolf finally decides to check in! How's it going, being a minor league Rambo in the cruel expanse of northeastern Kansas?” Dean's hackles instantly rise at this legacied douche's snide tone. Yeah, that's right, he can sneak into the personal files and break the lock with a pocket knife too, monkey suit. Well, Sam was probably _given_ his folder and told to know his knew charges by the higher ups, but whatever. Point is, Dean knows Winchesters were some of the original blokes that got this going, putting together the organization state wide and making it more than just a bunch of half-crazed zealots made up of gun nuts and mad scientists. Every son down the line from several decades back has made their name in the Men of Letters and Sam is no exception.

The consummate brown noser has been rubbing elbows with the Men Upstairs since he could sit up on his own and he's had nothing but commendations, even when his whole team got taken out not too long back. There was an investigation, and all of that information was redacted in such large blocks of blacked out sentences, they could have saved the paper and just not printed out the results. Dean feels kind of guilty for looking down on him for that. After all, if they had found anything, he would have been kicked out in a heartbeat, and so that was really just a pure tragedy the likes of which they rarely see here.

Little happens for no reason in the world of the supernatural and so when it does, it's just hard to swallow down the disbelief. In any case, the kid's known for his intimidating frame as much as his obsessive mind and though he was flagged for monitoring during his recruitment for that, it's also what's got him known as one of the best handlers. The kid's got lore coming out of his ass and apparently he's good at picking at things and digging down until he finds the splinter.

“Ha ha, fucking-ha. If you really wanted to get in touch with me, we had our burners. I know how to do my job and you knew better than to speak until spoken to.” Dean grins as Charlie's eyes go wide and her fingers stop their spastic dance. She looks at him like he's about to get his head cut off, but also like it'll looking pretty bitchin' while he does. Sasquatch splutters into his receiver for a come back and Dean takes the faltering to dive right past the looming bitch fit they're about to have and into the important stuff.

“Now look here, there's something that ain't right about the touchdown site you gave us. We've been all over this town for the better part of the day and haven't found so much as a footprint in the dirt to say that someone's been here. I'd say there's some sort of cache that it's been going down in, but this place has three stoplights and the busiest building is the bowling alley, so--” Dean throws his arms up in the air, and makes a face at Charlie, who gives him a hesitant, but assenting nod at that point.

She's pulled her own piece out of her jacket pocket by this point and starts setting it up to get in on the conversation. “He's right. I already know about three separate affairs that are going on behind everyone's back and was invited into the middle of one. We've definitely turned over every sleazy, backwoods leaf.” She cringes and Dean can't help but snort, remembering the look of utter panic that crossed her face as she tried not to stare at the woman with no bra, double D's, and tits that pointed in two different directions who called her precious. It was a goddamn Kodak moment if he's ever encountered one.

Sam sighs audibly into their line, because he's a dickbag filled with tinier dickbags, and then there's nothing but loud rustling and murmured voices for a few moments. If Dean could shoot steam of his ears, he'd be there, and even Charlie looks annoyed at it. “Oh, I'm sorry there sweetheart, did we interrupt you while you were getting your knob polished?” Dean doesn't even really get a full second to be pleased with himself over his childish mockery, because it's instantly ruined when Sam coughs awkwardly and chokes. “Oh, _gross_ man! Why the fuck did you pick up while you were having sex? What kind of sick fuck are you?”

“I wasn't having sex. We were just-- he was just--. I told him I was on the clock and you can't exactly stop someone from getting on their knees and--.”

“Noooope! No. Nuh-uh. Not today.” Charlie saves them all by wrenching out her earpiece with all the theatricality Dean has ever wanted in a partner and backing over to the door with her arms up like she's being held hostage. “I got a first row seat to your particular brand of homoerotica yesterday and I'm not being subjected to that again. I gotta go drink until my eyes are blurry or watch Blue is the Warmest Color or whatever it takes to get all these dicks _away._ ”

Dean only catches what he thinks is the full meaning of that by the time the door is closing and is simultaneously interested and disgusted. Charlie's awesome all on her own and now that she's officially queer, he's even happier to have her around. They're like a beat buddy cop duo made in heaven and don't have to deal with any kind of sexual tension at all now. Not that there would have been any anyway. Don't get him wrong, Dean loves his ladies just as much as anyone else, but he's kinda got his heart wrapped up in someone else right now and besides, Charlie already feels like more of a friend than he's ever had and he feels like that's something he desperately needs.

Onto what was gross about that though--. “Oh, hell no! I would not fuck this dude even if he could ream me and suck me off at the same time!” Dean screams in the hopes it makes it through the wood paneling just so she knows he's not having fun times with their superior. Sam's hot and all-- objectively-- but he's also cocky and stuck up and thinks that flat ass of his is made out of gold. Dean's beautiful, weird, _sexy_ blue-eyed boy isn't anything like that hulk of a guy over his earpiece, and though Dean would probably jack off to his sex tape, the idea of actually having sex with Sam makes him more flaccid than pink taffy being pulled in the summer sun.

Sam chokes in his receiver again and then grits his teeth in a somehow audible way. “Believe me, even if I triple bagged it, I wouldn't put my dick anywhere near you.” There's a very obvious sort of menace in his voice, one that says he was probably teased about sex during puberty and it stung in some pretty bad ways, but it's also undercut by him being just as clear about being embarrassed by his own words. For all the vulgarity, it feels like he only just managed not to stage whisper that and it has Dean snorting in reply. Really, at this point he should be trying to apologize and ingratiate himself to Sam if he wants any good info before nightfall, but he just can't help himself. He's kind of a jackass, and yeah it gets him slapped a couple times and outright decked a couple more, but it also has gotten him into more homes and pants over his career and love life to discount.

“Puh-lease. I'm probably already number one in your spank bank-- beat it to the thought of throwing me around a little, using your height to get around my build. Bet you like my pretty eyes and lips, wouldn't mind holding my hair and teaching me some respect while taking your dick.” Dean grins when there's a sharp intake of breath and then measured silence in reply. Oh ya, goodie two shoes are always into that kind of shit. They love getting spanked and saying sir and being real dirty when no one expects it. “Just so you know, my pubes are blonde and my ass and thighs are freckled. Oh-- and I'm uncut.”

Dean snickers as he cuts his line right there, knowing he blew his chance to have Sam get anything done for him already, and besides, he already said all there is that he has. After the sasquatch cools down a bit and probably hate-wanks a little, he'll remember that they're empty handed, and based on his personality profile, it'll drive him nuts just thinking about it. Dean will have new research to sift through in the morning for sure.

And until then, Cupcake Wars is calling and Cas is always looking for some new recipe to try. He loves trying to privately one up the teams on tv and Dean loves coercing him into making some new bacon topped, beer battered something. His dawning love handles should make him reconsider, but Cas thinks they're cute and kisses the paunch of his belly about one thousand percent more than when it was flat, so there's no help to be had there.

He'll wait it out another day, and try to use those facts to distract himself from the truth that it might bring blood with it, and that's at least part his fault.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me over at dream-tempo.tumblr.com


	3. Chapter 3

**Sam**

Sam's back at a console before he's even really sure that Cas is asleep. The fallen angel is contorted in awkward shapes on the low, open-armed couch in the common area of the bunker, just down the hall. Sam would have offered his bed in his numbered alcove down deeper into the structure, but its only a twin, and he knows he would have been roped into sleeping when he's got a job to do. As it is, he's still laying down a towel before he sits, grimacing as cooled cum slowly trickles from his ass and distracts him just often enough to be annoying. He'd really prefer to take a shower and finger it all out and down the drain, wipe away the tawdry pungence of it all as soon as the passion was over, but right now he needs to feel it, needs to acknowledge the grime of what just went down. 

Cas was obviously distraught-- closed off and aggressive like he's never seen before. He should have said no for longer, should have pushed him off and asked him questions, should have tucked him in and said they always had the morning. But Cas was on his knees, and they hadn't even fucked the last time, and work was stressful, and, and, and--. There were a thousand little excuses but no good reasons, but he still spent the night with his ass in the air, holding one of Cas' hands low to his hip, caring only that it felt good for him, and pretending he didn't notice when Cas started to cry after it was all over. 

He chews his fingernails down until they start to bleed and searches for the relevant reports to try and make sense of why Dean and Charlie couldn't find a single sign of demons where he sent them. Maybe catching a monster can serve as his penance for being a grade A dick to the guy he thinks he might be falling for. It's the only way to soothe the nausea that's taken up residence deep in his stomach and maybe to get his legs to stop jittering at a pace that makes the muscles sore in minutes.

He gets up as soon as he nails down the location of the accounts he'd linked together-- large, bare feet thudding against the metal as he makes his way to the witness archives. He feels damn near disgusted with the heavy swing of his long, wet cock, the dangle of it making meaty slaps against his thighs as he moves. It's always felt garish to him, a kind of ridiculous and unwieldy that he eventually got over with his size fourteen shoes and big 'n tall suits, but that he'll never quite find comfort with even as an adult, when everything else is more or less proportional.

He's not that reedy teenager that changed in the toilet stalls of the locker room because the length and slimness of his dick made it look like it was stretched, but it still hung over-long on his body, drooping under it's own weight, curved to point at his toes even when he was fully hard. He trims his pubes and waxes the cheeks of his ass (though he'll never be convinced to get the dark, soft smattering out of his crack) but he still feels unkempt just by the nature of it. Most times he keeps himself neatly and expertly tucked in his custom made trunks, with a tailored pouch to hold it static, but when he wants to stave himself off his typically dark insatiability, he lets himself stew in his own uncomfortableness long enough to beat it back.

He likes sex, he always has, and he gets consumed by it in a way that means just about nothing is off limits during the act. Anything to stoke the flames inside him and make the release more explosive. But once he gets over sensitive, once he feels how sticky the sweat is and smells the pungency of his acts, he's disgusted by the minutia of sex. He likes to clean up immediately afterwards-- stands as soon as his legs allow and washes the sweat from his pits and the saliva from his tits and the cum from where it's coated his sac. He washes his sheets before he lays in them again and throws his trunks in as well, always gushing enough pre to soak the front through. 

Sex is messy and primal and mindless and once it's done, he has to lock away that animal part of himself good and tight. The cleaning helps. Smoking helps more. His work is what really wipes it away and turns his mind to other things. So he rummages through accordion folders to double check each account himself, and tries to ignore his own wafting ball smell as he does, gritting his teeth against how bad he wants to cross his legs to hide away and try and save himself at least a little from it.

No matter how many times he rereads the reports, rearranges the information, it all turns out to have the same results. There were confirmed signs of demons roaming around that section of Kansas. But everything was out in the fields, with nothing around for miles. So he just shipped them out to the nearest town that seemed to be the origin of the summoning call. It made sense that someone looking to make a deal with a demon would drive out of the town limits to do it. People could feel it in their hearts when they were doing dark rites, and there was the inherent instinct to keep that secret, to ferret the truth away.

It's possible he just got the town wrong, that someone drove from two hours in the other direction, but it wasn't probable. You stay in this business long enough and you learn to trust your gut. Half the job becomes feeling out what's right and going for that. Hunters and Men of Letters alike will tell you that, and so Sam just _knows,_ feels it deep down in him that there's something different about this case. If the instigator wasn't in that town, then there's something different happening here. Maybe a different monster with similar signs. Maybe someone hoaxing them to try and draw a team out.

Dean's not gonna like it, but there's only really one option, because the well of information has run dry on both their ends. He and Charlie are going to have to head out into the epicenter and find the site where the demon crawled up and out of the bowels of its home.

* * *

 

Cas comes to find him a few hours later, new accounts in front of him with black and white photos paper-clipped to the top of the stacks. One boy and one girl, both in their early twenties, both with close to two dozen jobs under their belts before they earned the red rubber stamp across their records that says DECEASED. He hears the careful footsteps on the metal and tries to rush to put them back together in their proper order, but the fallen angel is there before he's stacking them up right, and he's startled out of his rush by a hand gliding over his shoulder. It makes Sam tense at first, but when it just holds, slides down his collar bone to rest over his chest, he relaxes into it and lets out his held breath.

Cas will only know he's trying to hide them now if he smashes the front closed and throws them into a drawer without a word. So he slumps back and lays his head against the furry stomach behind him, oddly charmed by the dark hair covering pale skin and obscuring the lack of a navel. “You should really try and catch some sleep. Your men will be needing you come morning and you want to be your best for them.” He doesn't say it like a judgment or in a chastising way, but instead this gentle reminder, that's just as concerned for him as his hunters.

Sam turns his face to press it into that sleep warm skin, inhaling their sex still on his body, but finding it so much less repulsive somehow. It's almost comforting on Cas... homey. Like he's just so comfortable with himself and around Sam that crusted cum is a tertiary sensation. Utterly on instinct Sam presses lingering kisses wherever his mouth can reach, feeling awash with someone else's easy affection. 

Cas pets through his hair with one hand as the other reaches out to peruse through those files that are classified, for company eyes only, but Sam lets it go as he starts to hum-- doesn't even bat an eye as Sam whimpers in need and starts licking at his treasure tail like a cat trying to groom him. He just feels this... this _need_ when he's around Castiel. He feels almost like a child or an unreserved animal, acting purely on unfounded instinct and looking for acceptance and love in return. He feels half crazy with it, like his psyche is always just about to break and he'll slip into some sub-space or puppy play that's more permanent than he's okay with. 

“These were your charges-- the kids that died. It's their funeral tomorrow, isn't it?” Cas' voice tilted up for the question, but it still sounded a hell of a lot like a statement, and Sam's heart stops for just a second when it's put there out in the open. He's still not sure if he's going to go, still not sure that he's allowed, but he doesn't want to blow it off either, doesn't want to look like they didn't matter to him and he couldn't care less. “Kevin and Joanna. One from the Academy, the other recruited after demons threatened his mother. Hmm... they got a lot done with their time here.”

Cas just keeps talking-- little murmurs of comments that aren't anything Sam doesn't know, but are still good to hear. It's true, they were good at what they did and everyone thought they'd be earning some rank here any time soon. Sam got along with them famously, never got tired of talking to them over comm's, treated them to beer and steak dinners whenever they came back with another success under their belts. Eighteen months. Just long enough to get close and really miss them once they were gone. That's all it took for him to get them killed. 

He pulls Castiel around his chair and closer by the ass, wrapping his arms around that slight midsection and lipping now along his hipbones, licking at that masculine 'v' of muscles. It feels so good to be close to somebody, feels like he isn't so close to drowning. He wants to turn Cas around and bend him over, wants to use spit as slick and fuck him till his cock is too sore to keep going. Maybe he'll get tired enough to pass out right over his back, still inside of him. It would make this buzzing in his head and behind his teeth quieten, if only for a few hours.

“i could go with you, if you wanted.” It freezes him in place. It stops every gear in his head, throws him completely off track. That isn't-- he didn't think-- why would Castiel make that offer? Slowly, Sam unlinks his hands where they'd been locked in the small of Cas' back, and withdraws them, taking his body away with it and looking up at the man that never stops surprising him. It almost feels like a trap, but Sam always thinks that way when people offer him things without a condition.

Not that he'd be out of line, wondering why Castiel isn't already bargaining for something in exchange. “Why would you go to a funeral with me? Especially one for hunters. You know if one of the Men Upstairs makes an appearance and guesses you out, there's no way you'll make it out of there. Everyone at this base keeps your secret now because they're not ambitious-- they won't sell you down the river just to get ahead-- but they're survivalists by necessity and they'll take you out to save their hides if they have to.”

Castiel looks down at him with a nearly bored expression in reply-- bored in the face of his own capture, torture, and mortality-- and just shrugs, still running his hands through Sam's long, loose hair. “You don't give me enough credit-- on level of discretion nor my power if that were to fail me. I'll be safe, I've been taught well. You're the one that needs helping.” He offers a sad smile and searches Sam's eyes as though he could see everything he needs to in the soft color of them.

Sam often feels like he's just out on display for this angel to see, that he can't hide whatever he's been so good at keeping to himself all the other years of his life. Those unblinking, undeterred eyes stared right past whatever walls he'd spent so long building and weren't intimidated by what they saw. That was almost more frightening than the idea that Castiel knew all his deepest, darkest secrets from the moment they met. “I don't need help.” Sam scoffs at the end, but that just makes his voice sound weaker for it, more unsure than a child that can feel itself being taught a lesson.

Castiel smiles at him then, amused and pitying, and chuckles a little as he bends at the waist to kiss Sam's forehead, his nose, his lips. “You look like a cat that got left out in the rain. All the time.” It's whispered against his lips to feel like an endearment, but Sam scrunches his eyes at just how much it isn't. “You're torn up about this, whether you want anyone to know it or not, and you need to get all the shrapnel out if you want to stop bleeding.”

Cas lets his hands slip down to Sam's neck, cupping the tendons, warm and firm for a moment, before running over the notable swell in his shoulders and then down to his large hands. He tugs at them, short, sharp, little jerks to try and usher him out of the wooden chair worn smooth with ages of use. Sam puts up enough of a fight to make it seem like he's reluctant, sighing and everything as he stands, but his heart trips over itself at being fondly nagged in such a manner.

He switches his weight from leg to leg as he patiently waits for Cas to put the files away for him, feeling awkward in his nakedness for a completely different reason than before. If any of his fellows knew he'd been dragging his used ass all over the base, they'd hardly be able to look him in the eye come morning. Cas notices his nearly pubescent teen mannerisms and laughs as he shakes his head, reaching out again as he approaches, but this time completely bypassing Sam's offered hand to grip at his soft length of cock and then walking away.

Sam nearly trips over himself with a loud yelp as he follows just to avoid getting his dick yanked, but stumbles with just about every footfall. His entire body, including his brain, is completely numbed with shock and he has no idea how to react. He just continues to stare at where he's being lead around by his phallus, choking on the words he hasn't thought up yet, mortified by every second he lets it continue. 

But he's at his room before he's even halfway to recovering and he's unceremoniously shoved into his bed before he can ask any questions. “Humans are such prudes in the oddest of instances. You know God created every aspect of your bodies, right? Your dicks and asses and labia were all given to you freely to do whatever the fuck you wanted with. In fact, you were encouraged to have fun with and explore them. The male pleasure center is best accessed through your back door for christssake.” He says it like everyone is ridiculous, like people should be openly having sex in the streets or something.

“Ya, well... Some people think that's all just some sort of test, that we're supposed to overcome our base instincts to be good and decent. Struggle breeds character and so resisting such strong urges is supposed to be the sign of a strong and dedicated person. Gandhi used to lay naked with women just to prove he could remain pure in the face of temptation.” Cas _rolls his eyes_ as he tugs at the covers under Sam's body, getting him to arch his back off the mattress to pull them free before covering him up with them.

“You're all so damn self important, aren't you? God didn't make you to be the destiny of the universe or whatever shit you're all thinking. You're animals, part of the playthings in his massive collection. Sure, you're his favorite, but that's mostly because you're batshit crazy. Sex is there to have some fun and to relieve the stress of living. The whole reproduction thing is a handy byproduct, not the other way around.” The matter-of-factness of this seems to counteract any possible argument that could be given, even though there's still a lot to be said, especially about that last line.

But Cas is already up and across the room, and besides, it wasn't like he was looking for a fight anyway, just making incredulous statements. Sam can't fault him for that simplistic way of looking at things, especially when he already has so much to deal with on a personal level. He guesses when you grow up as an extraterrestrial being from another plane, all the other parts of life just seem inconsequential in comparison. “Would you really be okay with going to that funeral with me?” Is all he croaks out as the lights are flicked off and Castiel is turning to leave. God, when did he revert to his seventeen year old self again?

There's a long pause in the time before the reply, but not a tense or painful one. It doesn't feel like Cas reevaluating his offer, but instead him thinking on the fact that it might actually be accepted. “Yes.... Yes, I think I would.”

* * *

 

**Castiel**

You don't know what compelled you to make this offer, or what kept you here after you'd confirmed it. There were so many chances to change your mind or skip out on your word and yet, somehow, you're standing in front of him as he buttons up a crisp, white shirt, and ironing his tie. You'd like to say that it's because he just looked so damn pathetic, sitting there naked, debauched, and seconds away from weeping last night. There's nothing sadder than a man that's only got his cock out because he's too depressed to put it away, but even as that's an undeniable fact, using it an an excuse for why you're trying to think of an outfit you have that's appropriate for a funeral is avoiding the truth.

The truth that there's something about this wreck of a person that you're drawn to, that you can't escape the gravity of. The two of you have collided in so many violent, destructive ways, and yet you can't veer off each others' paths, destined to keep crashing together until you figure out why that is. And so, for right now, you're not putting up a fight. You're looking headlong into this inevitability and deciding to make something of it. There's something immutable in each of you, calling out beyond your bodies and gripping on to parts instinctual. 

Sam's afraid of it, you can sense that in him, but you've been living with a foreign presence in your body for as long as you can remember, and you're done with treating it like it's absolute. That cosmic font of power that's seated deep inside you might react different than your emotions, but you're past the point of battling it for control. It's a part of you, and so you have to read those influences, have to acknowledge yourself as a being that comprehends on more levels than you can see.

You're not sure yet, what it means that you can't leave him alone and he's all wrapped up in you, but you'll only ever find out by engaging it, and so you're not gonna push him away. It might be important. It might hold they key. It might set you to rest and finally let you just enjoy what you have instead of reaching to know more and more and more.

Besides, spending time with him isn't exactly a chore. He might be more unstable than the animal ingredients they stockpile here for their spell components, but he's also wildly smart and impassioned. He's charming, but that's tapered at just the right points where he also puts his foot in his mouth frequently and obviously is a little bit obsessive, even about boring things like craft brew beer. He'll talk just about any subject into the ground and be excited about it for hours after. Plus he is built like a brick shithouse and fucks like he'll die if he isn't properly sated. 

He's fun, and easy to be around-- at most junctures. So getting the chance to examine one more thing about this alien physiology that you're still trying to understand fully is just an awesome bonus for having another friend inside the system, and this time, one with a completely different access point. He gives you a shaky smile as soon as he's done tucking his shirt in, unaware that he tucked it into his trunks instead of his pants, and that everyone would be able to see the “XXL COMFORT” stitched into the elastic waistband. You yank on the cord to unplug the iron, chuckling at the fact that it makes him wince, and saunter over, tossing the pressed fabric around his neck before reaching down to fix his mistake. He makes a surprised, pleased noise at first, thinking you're reaching for something else, and then blushes as you pick an errant pube off the white hem before retucking.

“You need to calm down and take things slower. Slow as you need. It's better than showing up a harried, manically smiling mess. It's okay to be somber at a funeral, I promise.” You button his flat fronts back up and pull the seam away to drag the zipper, being methodical for him as you also move to tie the tie and adjust his collar. His whole body is vibrating with jitters and you'd offer to take the edge off if you thought that it would help. But an orgasm isn't a quick fix for everything, no matter how much people want it to be, and you think it would just make his skin feel too tight and too sensitive, his body more wrung out than before.

“You should go outside and get a smoke. Breathe some fresh air before gifting your lungs a few, good black spots.” You smirk at him as he glares at you, smoothing out the wrinkles in his shirt before clapping your hands on his shoulders in finality. “Besides, this way you won't see whose suit I steal to wear today. Plausible deniability and all that.” He breathes out a long, stuttering breath before pushing his hair back and nodding, already fishing for the pack on menthols in his jacket pocket as he makes his way to the exit.

You follow him to the stairs and watch him ascend a little ways before heading back into depths of the bunker, winding towards the bunk area to find someone with a suit relatively your size. You pull out your burner as you go, knowing Dean will have to be awake for work already, and hoping he's just driving somewhere and not in the middle of an interview or kill. You're still pissed that he only got to spend a day with you this last time before he was sent back out and you want to pretend you're both in some cheap, shitty, charming motel room off some backroad across the country.

You've never been on the road with him before and you'd love to see all the places he's loved being the most. You want to eat at greasy diners with him-- sit on the same side of the booth and fight to get the most off the single plate of fries you ordered. You want to take photos in front of cheesy tourist attractions like the country's biggest ball of yarn, and then frame them to scatter all over the house. You want to get three dollars in change from the laundromat just so you can keep the magic fingers going on the mattress the whole time you're making love and then struggle to fit in the shower together afterwards.

It's a dream you haven't told him yet, but one that you've got plans for. There's all kinds of rest-stop pamphlets stuffed in the drawer of the sofatable-- a place Dean would never look because he thinks that's only for the mail-- along with a map you have hand marked your route on, written down everything your want to see and left plenty of room for Dean to show you things. You even tracked down one of those huge, monstrous double-machines to record your own roadtrip tapes for both of you to listen to, each one decorated with crude Sharpie drawings and way too many cheesy hearts. You're is almost ready to show it all to him, almost ready to leave this city and ask him to come with. There's just a few more things you have to figure out, and you think Sam will help get you there.

When you call, you gets Dean's voice mail, and that's a real bummer, but at least you get to hear his gruff outgoing message and you bite your lip as you wait for the tone. It's not a real surprise that you couldn't get him-- still-- it would have been good to just touch base a little, feel his warm smile across the receiver, imagine the way it crinkles the corner of his eyes. Your heart clenches as you thunk your head against the wall and start your voice mail with a sigh. “Hello Dean, just wanted to try and catch you before I head out. I'm gonna be out for most of the day so I wanted to make sure I heard your voice. I hope you're eating well enough to still have fun, but not be stuck on the can most of the day-- no more truck stop chili, remember? Anyway, you better come back to me soon.... I miss you.”

You hang up before you can get real sappy, because if this were in person, he would have kissed you quiet by now. Dean's about as romantic as they come, but he still gets overwhelmed by words, and though it's fun to sometimes watch him get to flustered with his own affection that he can't function, you like to save him from the struggle more often than not, especially since he's always so obviously grateful, and is so good at expressing himself through his body to make up for it. Whether it's whittling tokens or showing off in a pool hall, or just really great, slow and tender sex, Dean knows how to say all the right things without using a single sentence.

You take a couple seconds to close your eyes and breathe, feeling every ounce of your need for him before letting it go, and reorienting yourself here and now. Sam's outside waiting and you need a suit.

* * *

 

It's not raining, despite the fact that it's almost always raining here and there's a funeral going on, besides. You think the universe would just award this one and let everyone huddle under umbrellas while they watched the coffins lowered and have them feel the full, life-altering weight of their sadness personified in the very state of the atmosphere. Instead the ground is just a musty sort of wet, especially with all the leaves having fallen off the trees by now. The cemetery smells like a slightly less intense composting heap, and everyone is trying their best to let their grief show on their faces instead of disgust.

And because there's no rain, they can put blown up portraits of the two kids they're laying to rest right now, having their images haunt the crowd with the fact that there's no longer anyone that belongs to those smiles. Not here, with them. Everyone is dressed nicely and so you're finding it nice and easy to blend into the crowd, but beside you Sam is trying too hard to shrink his frame and calling more attention than a tall man regularly would with the way he's hunching and trying to turn on his side.

You smack at his knee as a pastor appointed by the company presides over the gathered crowd, giving a speech that is equal parts religious iconography and rousing propaganda for the cause. It hits the sweetspot of funeral exploitation and you open everyone else tones their talks to try and match it. There will always be people pretending they were closer to the deceased than even their own family, and those that think they look pretty when they're sad, but hopefully they're rein themselves in at an affair that's nothing less than tragic.

Sam is staring at the ground for most of it, eyes covered by unnecessary sunglasses, and you lace your hands together when his won't stop shaking. He's chewed his fingernails down to stumps and is now working at tearing the skin off his lips, so you carefully drift against that brightness inside of you, that volatile star that's always pulsing and asking you to come and touch. It warms you up and fills you out and you close your eyes as you brush the backs of your fingers down his cheek.

He gasps softly and you know you're probably glowing, just a little, but you risk it to push some of that light inside of him to try and stabilize his fractured emotions. You can feel your inked feathers sliding around you back, and you have to work your best to get them not to manifest. They shift and scratch and bristle with the need to burst forward and _stretch_ , but you're practiced at keep them contained, especially when you reached out for your grace instead of having it burst forth in surprise. 

When you open your eyes a thin sheen of sweat has broken out across both your bodies, but he's standing still now and looking at you in awe. You smile before you tip your head back to where the cranks are now being turned to lower first Joanna and then Kevin into their final rest. He slides his hand back inside yours and keeps them clenched together until it's time for the dirt to be filled in. He surprises you, and everyone else there, when he steps forward to be the first person after the family members to grab a handful of dirt.

He squats between their graves, looking down at the parallel holes, and murmurs something under his breath-- goodbye's to each of them perhaps. He'll be able to visit them both, whenever he wants, here in the company graveyard. Anyone killed in action contractually has to be laid here instead of on their families plots, simply because getting killed by a creature in their line of work sometimes means they won't stay in the dirt for long. It's a cruel procedure, but ultimately a smart one, and it saves the family in pain over time. No one wants to see their family member to rise, only to see that it's not actually them in that body that you recognize. 

Judging from the wide smile he gives them each, crying openly as he throws a handful of dirt on their coffin lids before he rises, you think that he'll be the sort that comes here often-- switches out flowers and leaves pinwheels. Some people might think he's doing it all out of guilt, but you can see the affection there, can see the honest love he felt for the kids that made up his team. You hope it's cathartic and not just a way so he never has to let them fully go.

But you don't know him well enough to be sure of that, and you're not sure you'll be around long enough to see. You just might get your answers some day-- one sooner than you'd think-- and you just might convince Dean to run away with you. You're trying not to think of that, here in this sad place, but you've never had much of an idea of a future for yourself, and now that there's the possibility, it's a compelling idea.

He doesn't come right back to you, but instead straightens out his spine and makes his way over to the families where they're standing by the pastor. You're not sure whether it's because of the touch of grace or his own, shored up will, but you feel glad for him as he does it, seeing how it takes a great deal, but matters a great deal more for him to do. You keep your distance, not wanting to hear the details of what should be a private discussion, and not feeling right for standing beside him at a moment like that. It's too much for what your relationship is, might set him to thinking they're not what they are.

Sam ducks his head when he first approaches them, rubs the back of his neck and twists his mouth, but when he opens his mouth to speak, he looks them in the eye and doesn't shy away. He gets slapped, hard enough for it to echo off the other stones around them and catch the attention of every mourner here for them. Heads snap up to look at the confrontation automatically, on instinct, and then they're all trapped watching something they shouldn't.

It looks like it's about to turn outright into a soap opera, but then Joanna's mother, the one who delivered the blow, breaks into tears and pulls Sam into a fierce hug, burying her face in his shoulder and holding him tight. You turn away to let them have some time, walking back to Sam's car and taking the winding route through all the people that have given their lives to this job. You don't think you could survive it, if you only got to look at Dean's freckled, sunshine-y smile through a water stained portrait affixed to a worn stone. You couldn't bear the weight of him being under this ground, of never being able to talk again.

And every time he goes out into the field he risks it. Every time you let him walk away, you gamble with the fact that he might not come back. What could be worth those odds? No matter how big or small, what's worth the very possibility that you could only come say hi on this cold damp earth, could never feel him around you again? There are truths that still nag at you, things you still want to know, but are they really a need anymore?

They might have been when you were younger, when you only had Bobby, and when you didn't have the control not to hurt him, but things are different now. You want to see your father again, want to hear his gruff laugh and feel the affection when he cuffs you over the head instead of giving you a hug. You want to introduce him to your beautiful, bright boyfriend and watch Bobby give him a hard time before the reluctantly connect over their love of old cars. You want to make Thanksgiving dinner for the three of you and all eat until you're pained, rubbing the distended lump of mashed potatoes in your stomach as you wind down for the night. 

You want to grab Dean's hand and lead him up to your childhood bedroom, watch his cheeks turn pink as Bobby yells at you both to at least try and keep it down, and then have giggly, gassy, loving sex to top off the holiday.

It's true that Sam might be the final path to finally answering those questions that buzz around your brain at night, but you have no idea how long that path actually is, how hard it might be to traverse, or what you might have to give up to make it. The other man might finally be reaching a good place and you don't want to have to tear through him to get what you want. You've used him enough already, twisted his arm and bent your friendship.

What would really happen if you just let it all go? If you took all that teenage frustration that rubbed you raw and made you what you are today and left it behind? Just the thought of it is terrifying because that's the only thing that's been fueling you since you were just a kid-- the thing that's spurred you forward and kept you going-- but you're older now, different, now. You can't keep chasing what you've been after for that many years, especially since you found something much, much better along the way.

And maybe subconsciously you've been trying to do that. Maybe planning for the roadtrip and never pushing Gadreel and easing up on Sam are all signs that you're actually tired of all this fighting, all this struggle. Contentment is just as hard to take up as ambition, but yours is just at hand. You should grab it while you have the chance instead of just passing it on by.

You're not sure yet, not one hundred percent, but it feels kind of like the right thing to do, and if you've learned anything from hanging around Hunters and Men of Letters all these years, it's that you have to trust your gut above all else.

* * *

 

**Dean**

Hanging around that rinky-dink down, literally searching each crack in the sidewalk for clues really wasn't a bucket of fun, or even anything that felt like it was amounting to a good day's work. So it was easy enough to check out, get back in Baby, and get back on the road to try a different tactic. It felt fresh even, like coming at the problem from a new angle, and that was something that Dean could get behind. No one would describe him as a real thinker if they were ever to talk him up at a bar or to a friend, but he resents anyone that would call him stupid. He may not be able to list a jillion unimportant facts or take joy in watching the History Channel for five hours straight just to learn the history of the dude that came up with asbestos, but he's good at puzzles-- especially physical ones. He's never met a box with sliding panels he couldn't unlock, never been unable to put something back together, and could play music by ear since he was fourteen. 

That's what makes it sting so much when he figures out he's been tricked. Because they may have left that down behind and they may be trying another perspective on the case, but the work ain't changed one bit. No sir. Now they're being sent to the middle of some godforsaken field in the middle of all these bumfuck towns to comb through the rows and rows of corn or wheat for the exact same thing. Only difference is now he gets to try and avoid cow and horse shit instead of dog and now he has to eat bologna sandwiches out of of tinfoil instead of burgers out of plastic baskets.

This whole trip's shot to shit really and to top it all off, he missed a call from his angel sometime this morning, when he was just driving around doing nothing. He hadn't even noticed until they stopped to gas up and he had to take a piss. Coming back to see the pump still going, he looked for something to distract him from those climbing numbers and decided to give his little boy blue a call. Only thing was, his damn phone was dead.

What's the point of using a goddamn flip phone monstrosity as a burner if it doesn't even have enough battery life to stay on for a day and a half? He came _this_ close to smashing the thing on the ground in frustration when Charlie piped up in a sheepish voice, didn't meet his eyes as she admitted she spent the morning beating his high score on snake and may have been the reason the battery ran down so quickly. 

_That_ was an insult for two different reasons. One-- you don't use a dude's phone without asking! What if he had nudes on that thing? Cas loved the freckles on his but and the little blonde hairs and though this camera was so shit he probably wouldn't be able to get either, he'd be happy to try if his boy asked for it. And two-- he'd spent months getting that high score. He was fuckin' proud of that shit. It was the result of a whole four hours of a stakeout.

He narrowed his eyes at here and just stared until she offered to pay to fill up the tank and then scurried off to get them both coke slurpees with a hit of the cherry kind too. While she was filling them up and paying, he was plugging in his car charger and lamenting over the missed call notification, listening to the message and almost getting sick with knowing he couldn't just call back. It had been hours already, and he was sure whatever Cas was doing was in full swing by then.

It damn near breaks his heart to hear that dejected sigh at the beginning and then the 'I miss you' at the end and if ever there was a chance to deny that he was head over heels for this weird, nerdy, funny guy, he passed that exit a long time ago. All he wanted to do was hear that cute little growl Cas gives when he's gettin' kissed real good, mess with that soft, messy hair, and wrap their legs up together while watching the newest My Haunted House on the Lifetime Movie Network to try and guess if it was fake, or if they needed some real salt and burning type of help.

Not even a Cherry-Coke slurpee could help that sort of ache feel better, but it did keep him from being a grade-A ass to his partner for no good reason. Cas tells him there's nothing fiercer than one of his _moods,_ but he just contests that he doesn't _have moods_ because he's not a wasp woman going through menopause or a gap toothed kid whose balls just dropped. Either way, he's beyond ticked to have to be kicking his way through these stalks, having to get down in the mud to try and figure out if that's one of their boot prints and they've started going in circles, or if they finally have a trail to follow to the epicenter of the demon anomaly sightings.

“Sooo... are you like... married? Or something?” Charlie's voice floats over to him from somewhere to his right and he squints tightly to try and get a peek at her shock of red through all this dull yellow. “I only ask because I've never seen a guy watch his phone like that for a girlfriend or a booty call and definitely not for one of his siblings or parents. I know we don't talk about, 'the incident', but you're totally into whoever can convince you to have phone sex in a parked car.” 

Dean groans as he wipes a hand over his entire face, long and rough and slow, wanting to never, ever have to have this conversation or remember that mortifying moment. That was a bad start to an actually pretty decent partnership so far and he'd rather they try and pretend like it didn't happen. But they could still be here for hours and honestly, sitting in silence for the whole time is liable to drive him insane.

“N'aw, we're not married. I'm not even sure he's the marrying type... or that I am. And he _is_ a he, by the way. Not that we have to make a big deal of it or nuthin'.” Dean sniffs loudly out of pure reflex, the gross, masculine, _guy_ thing to do as an audible way of puffing up your chest. Took him a while to accept that part of himself, even as he got off with other dudes as soon as sixteen. He was just real good at burying it away. And even once he met Cas and they'd started they're... this, he had a hard time taking it out of the house, facing it when he wasn't drunk or in the middle of the act. Damn near broke them up before he bucked up and met it head on. But she doesn't need to hear all that. Not yet. “He ain't our boss either, just in case you weren't joking yesterday. His name is Cas and he's warm and sweet as sunshine.”

Just the idea of him puts a smile on Dean's face and a spring in his step as he continues searching, surprised with how good it feels to tell. It's nice that they're not sitting down across from each other at a diner or stuck elbow to elbow in the car right now. Makes it easier to say what he truthfully wants to say when he can't see her every reaction and doesn't have to have her watch his. “Eugh, really man? I mean, that's cute and all, I guess, but I thought you were a little more... metal than that.” There's a snicker in her voice, he can hear it, and he won't stand for that.

“Hey! Cas may serve his guests tea and wear panties with bows on them and grow herbs in his flower boxes, but he also does some of his own hunting too-- can take me out in a knife fight any day-- welds scrap metal into sculptures, and oh ya, is a motherfucking fallen angel. He's more metal than metalocalypse...” Wait--

“Oh. My. God. What?!” Shit. Goddamn shit. Dean can hear her running through the corn to find him, and by the sound of it, she's got a fix on where he's at too. He'll have to say _something_ in just a few seconds and there's not really a take-backsie on what he just dropped. 'Oh did you hear fallen angel? I meant fallen _Granger._ Ya, he's a real big Harry Potter fan, runs some forum for Hermoine fans that think she should've been the new headmaster for Hogwarts in the epilogue.' There's not enough bullshit in the world to sell that point.

She's on him before he can even try to have a less ridiculous thought and she has an expression on her face like someone that just followed a rainbow to find and actual pot of gold. “Look-- just... don't go telling every Tom, Dick, and Harry back at base, okay? We gotta kinda keep it low key because if he attracts enough attention--”

“Oh, they'll dissect him for sure.” She cuts in with a very serious and over-exaggerated nod, adding information to the story that really doesn't help anybody. “Fallen angels only happen like twice every century, and they're notoriously hard to find, let alone restrain. The ones the company has brought in have cost them a dozen men before, and usually the angels find a way to burn out their grace before we really have a chance to study it. It kills them, sure, but a built in cyanide capsule is a pretty great way to defend your secrets, isn't it? Heaven's one of the most obscure domains left to us and it's because of this ingenious design that makes it a pretty solid one-way path, y'know?”

Dean's face twists and he grits his teeth as she goes on, his voice coming out in a snarl when she finally leaves him an opening. “He isn't a _thing_ , alright? He's not some creature that you can justify cutting up because he's close enough to an animal. Don't talk like he's just a text book entry waiting to happen-- something for all of you to geek out over once he's dead. He _matters_ and I thought you would have actually understood that.”

He shoves past her without even giving a moment for her to react, storming deeper out into the field in a random pattern, not caring if he gets lost, just needing some space to breathe. This is why he does it alone. This is why he doesn't share his shit with anybody. All of them are so far up their own asses they can't actually be bothered to take a second and grow some goddamn empathy. Everyone in this business has that same coldness, that same clinical touch.

The Men of Letters that facilitate it all, his fellow Hunters that are basically all riding the line of serial killer. They all just want they excuse to go as far as they can-- farther than they'd be allowed in the real world. Where else can you be paid to kill things? To shoot them up and cut them down and burn them till there's nothing left? Where else could you slice them up and take them apart and play with the pieces until you find something useful to do with them? They're all fucked in the head, all of them, and Dean doesn't want to end up that way.

He got in it to help people-- most of them do-- but then you start liking it, the chase, the hunt. You get vendettas, you mete out revenge, you let it take pieces of you and twist them up. The longer you're there the less and rhyme and reason there is to doing it. It's all just because you can, and he doesn't want to let it get that far. He can't.

What would his momma think of him, if she saw what he did? Her little boy turned into this mean, violent thing. And that's not what he wants for him and Cas either. He's tired of having to hide his angel away, of always being afraid that they're not gonna make it out the next few months. He doesn't want Cas to have to fight anymore, or to have to spend nights stitching him back together and worrying over possible infection while Dean bleeds onto his sheets.

And they may be young now, but they won't always be. Dean won't be this strong or limber, this fast or sharp, and he already gets his fair share of hurt as it is. What happens when his joints start to creak and his eyes go a little blurry and his extra husk really slows him down? Does he really want Cas to try and put his innards back or to have to take his leg? They're lucky enough not to live in a war time, so why should they be putting each other through these kinds of horrors, especially when there's always the possibility of accidents and disease just in every day life?

What if-- what if Dean _was_ the marrying type? What if he wanted to put a ring on the finger of that sweet angel? Find a little house with a yellow kitchen and a sill to put pies on-- maybe get a dog, not have to fall asleep to the sirens in the city, have a real garden instead of just window boxes. Dean could fix cars and mow the lawn and introduce his neighbors to his adorable husband who just made lemon squares for everyone. He could gossip at the mail box with all the housewives and maybe sign up for a book club.

Why not? He's into all of that shit, dreamed about it on his own when he was just a kid in the suburbs before all this mess. Hell, maybe even one day they'd want to adopt a kid of their own and paint a nursery together. Dean would get chubby(er) and Cas would read all the parenting books and they'd share dad jeans that gave them the flattest asses. He could see them like that. Fuckin' domestic coming out the wazoo. 

He could escape all this bullshit, all these people if he wanted to, could grab himself a better life now that he's got all the adrenaline out of his system, now that he doesn't feel the need to go and go and go, to be part of something huge and make a name for himself. Now he just wants to be happy, happy and here, and the odds of that in this life are grim. 

It figures that the moment he's given up looking, when he finally doesn't care whether or not he finds any sign of this friggin' demon, that he hears a snap beneath his boot-- one that's sharp and rings out across the field, not the dull crackle of the crops. Dean closes his eyes and all the fight goes out of him in a breath because he knows without even looking that he finally found something. He can smell dried blood soaked into the earth, tinged with the acrid pungency of sulfur. When the wind blows strings of something rattle with it, and there's no turning around and ignoring it.

Dean steps back, taking foot off that piece he broke, and opens his eyes, looking down at a macabre shrine set up in the middle of nowhere. An animal skull-- cat from the looks of it-- lashed to a post with symbols painted against the bleached surface. The clacking is strings of stones with holes in the middle, whistling when they catch the wind just right, an awful, discordant tune. There's a knife made out of some kind of jagged, shiny stone at the base along with idols-- their twisted faces carved out of tree roots, gnarled and crooked. Something was burned in a bowl that's been placed on a tiny alter, raised halfway between the skull and the ground, and there's blood soaked into the earth all around it-- no way to tell what from without bringing a sample back to base. 

This wasn't any sort of crossroads summoning, not the low level grunt that they're used to. Dean can't get a lot from this off the top of his head, but he knows for sure now why there wasn't any evidence in town. This isn't the work of some unhappy local that happened to stumble upon a book of magic in the library that had some truth to it. This isn't a box filled with hair and few little mementos buried in the dirt.

Who ever did this is a studied occultist, someone who's in on the game and has some experience on their back. There's all kinds of different reasons to build a shrine-- to mark someone for death, to ask for protection over a house, to pledge fealty to something in a vie for power-- and that's just listing a few, but knowing there was a demon involved, limiting the scope to infernal lore instead of chasing pagan gods or trickster spirits or curses, they can look in just one area and they can know their best angle of attack.

It's only the first step in figuring out what the motive is, but they're gonna get lots as far as the what the how and it turns out Sam didn't fuck up the where, so that's a decent amount of their boxes ticked. Honestly, stumbling upon this was a bit of a homerun and Dean's got no doubt that they'll be able to parcel out the pieces quick. As shady as they are, there's not a lot the Men of Letters don't know, and it's what almost makes working for them worth it. They've got their own designs, but they've also got all the knowledge and the equipment to beat back the darkness proper.

Plus, this will all have to be examined by hand, cross-referenced and given second opinions before they confirm a single direction to head in for sure. That means he gets to load all this up and head on back home. “Charlie! Bring the camera and some shit to bag a bunch of stuff up. We've got a lead.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and feedback are much appreciated. I'm dream-tempo over on tumblr as well, so come and babble to me about anything/everything.


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